Raising Ramiro

By Gwyneth Harold

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Tension in Ramiro’s family rises when his father takes him away from living on the illegal

fishing beach with his mother and to a life where his career now rests on the

performance of one horse. Without realising it, the mythical strength of seven young

people prepares each member of the family for his or her own moments with destiny.

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Author’s note

This novel includes alternate histories and make-believe events from the lives

of Jamaica’s seven national heroes.

Aside from the National Heroes of Jamaica and the former Member of the

House of Assembly and Custos of St Andrew, Joseph Gordon, no character in

this book is based on a real person.

The Jamaica St Leger is an annual race that is held at the Caymanas Park

racetrack in July. In this story, the race is in October at a fictional racetrack,

Augusta Racecourse.

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To Portmore, the first home that our parents made for us.

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Raising Ramiro

Chapter 1

Ramiro hopped off the bottom step of the bus, as it came to a halt, and ran across the soft, baking sand. As the afternoon wind blew in gusts, tossing fine, cream coloured grains in the air, he ran - bowed and squinting - until he entered the shade of one of the long, rectangular huts that had long settled into Bonny Beach.

The people who used these huts considered them to be gifts of God from the sea. Everything that built them and that came into them was connected to the clear waters that eternally bathed the shore.

Each slim post that held its burden of roof was a mangrove trunk that was cut out from the nature reserve in the nearby wetlands. Nailed to the posts - tops and sides - were planks cut from every kind of softwood tree growing in the protected forests that clung to the rocky hills above the beach. The floors were powdery sand that was once exposed to the sun, but now gave soft passage to Ramiro as he adjusted his eyes to the dimness of the well ventilated room, where no sand blew in.

Ramiro made his way past empty rows of benches and tables to the rear where his mother was steaming red snapper on a stove behind a counter. The only other person in the building was a slim man sitting on a stool and sipping ginger beer from a dark brown bottle. Ramiro greeted his mother with a mumble and put his school bag under the counter. He opened the bag, felt in-between the exercise books and a small bag of marbles and took out a wood handled ratchet knife. Carefully exposing the blade, he gingerly tested it against his thumb. It was sharp.

He opened the ice chest and took out a parrot fish, then - still in his school uniform – he kotched on an empty soda bottle crate just outside a door to the rear of the hut. This was one of his favourite times of the day - the hours between school and dusk when he worked with his mother in her seaside cookshop. With two steady hands, and one agile wrist, the scales came flying off the fish in an iridescent spray. He loved the feel of the blade sliding along the cold guts of fish separating the gills from the head. It gave him a sense of pride to pull out all the entrails in one long piece. Within three minutes he had that fish clean, and he placed it in an aluminium pan and reached for another.

The man, who had put down his drink to watch Ramiro exclaimed, "The little youth good man! What-a-way him scale the fish fast!"

Lilly removed the steamed snapper from the pot and placed it in a bowl with crackers. Then she ladled the soup from the pot to cover the fish, and placed two festivals on a separate plate. She served the meal to the man, her customer.

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"Him come after school every day and help me out. The higgler dem fight to pay him to do their gutting because him do it fast and clean and don't mash-up them fish."

She felt a good deal of pride for having raised, so far, a helpful son, and enjoyed a moment of luxury just gazing at him, finding small reasons to privately love him more. Her eyes traced the unblemished, youthful curves of his face and his arms, then her countenance hardened as she looked at his khaki trousers. Sitting bent over, with his elbows on his knees, caused the contents of Ramiro’s pockets to be pushed up from the bottom and be exposed in the gaping mouth of fabric. Peeping out of the corner of a pocket was a brightly coloured card. Lilly grabbed the boy's trousers waist and pulled the surprised youth into a standing position. His body was unprepared for the jerk, and not used to beatings, he feared no pain and remained limp. Too late he realized her focus, and grabbed his pocket a moment after his mother pulled a deck of playing cards from it.

"Cards bwoy? Cards? How much time I tell you fi stop gamble? Before you study your book, you deh a school a gamble!”

Lilly made an inexpert swipe for the side of his head. Two of the cards scattered from her hand and landed softly at her feet. The Queen of spades landed face up and was then covered by the Jack of Diamonds.

"Easy deh, Mother", said the customer.

Lilly made a show of ripping up the cards that she held, scraped up the pieces and the whole cards that had escaped her, and flung them into her rubbish pail. Ramiro sat back down and continued to clean the fish, carefully following his mother’s actions through the corners of his eyes. She was on familiar ground with her quarrelling.

"The Bible teach that gambling is bad. I tired to talk to the bwoy. Every day he goes to school and gambles. He must study his book and stop dealing with those things."

The man shook his locks away from his face and took a bite from another piece of festival. He decided to stay outside of the family affair; time would just have to work everything out. Another customer came in and Lilly moved away to take the order. When she returned to her cooking area she continued to fuss under her breath that hard-of-hearing boys go wayward. Still scaling fish on his crate, Ramiro made a mental note to deduct the cost of a new pack of cards from the winnings in his pocket that he would give to his mother later.

During mid week outside of holiday seasons, sales at the Bonny Beach cookshops were low, so Ramiro’s mother closed up before dusk and they cleaned up. He raked the

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sandy floor, picked up all of the refuse, bagged it and did the long walk from the beach to the main road and added his load to the huge heap that awaited collection.

The day wind diminished as the sun descended behind the hazy bulk of the distant western hills, leaving the sky to complete the sunset as a dim artist’s wash, more water than colour. It was one of the quiet times of the beach before the evening wind – a warm breeze that carried the concrete, asphalt, exhaust fumes and cooking heat aromas that it collected from the communities that lay a few miles behind the hills, the mangroves and the beach.

As the Western sunset struggled to blush even a faint red, the Eastern moonrise dressed itself in indigo before the unveiling of black night. It was going to be a boring evening. Waiting on land breeze was about the only other thing that Ramiro could expect tonight.

There was no electric light in his mother’s home, which was one of a cluster of one-room buildings set back from the shore, in-between the cookshops and the dunes and the scrub and the garbage heap and the road where he now stood.

He considered his options. He could catch the final hour of strong daylight and do some homework, or he could get up early tomorrow morning and get in half an hour before he had to get ready to go to school. He felt a bit tired, so decided to do his lessons in the morning. That meant that the whole empty night stretched out ahead of him.

His mother did not allow him to idle by the fishermen and listen at the edges of their conversation, but even if he did sneak out for a short while the fishermen would be getting ready to go take the best advantage of the bright moon in the clear sky and go out far tonight.

To kill some time before darkness, Ramiro decided to walk along the road, beyond his bus stop.

He went in the direction of oncoming traffic, pressing into the prickly roadside scrub every time he heard the hum of an approaching engine and saw white orbs of light approaching. As the roar of the vehicle passed, he felt the blast of warm air when the vehicles whizzed by - too close for safety. There was no sidewalk, and in the shadowy dusk, the driver could easily mistake his form for a small tree.

Ramiro reached a sandy track that led from the main road back to another section of the beachfront. Without thinking, he took it. These paths were created by recreational line fishermen who carefully drove on the grassy spots, keeping away from the soft sand of the beach. The shore had mangroves growing right up to the water’s edge, and grasses somehow rooted in the uneven sand. It was not a good beach for swimming, and the near reef made it unsafe for boating, but bandits and other lawbreakers still

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came in there, he heard. The reef was a reasonable risk for quiet access to the sea, so it was not a good idea to roam alone there at night, but Ramiro did it anyway.

There was nowhere to hide here, so he saw that someone was digging in the sand.

If the sea had not been absolutely still, Ramiro would not have heard the very soft push of arms and hands scooping sand to dig a hole. The digger’s head was almost in the hole, and he saw the arms push sand up. The movements became even more careful the deeper the hole became. Then the head came up, and he saw that it was one of the girls who lived on the beach. Her arm was outstretched, and in it was the perfect round, whiteness of an egg.

“Leave the nest alone,” he said, without thinking.

She must have been startled because she immediately cowered and made to crawl away, then she saw who it was, relaxed, and sucked her teeth as she slyly smiled at him.Gayle had this uncanny way of smiling all of the time, so that you never really knew what was going on in her mind. She was a very thin girl with bold eyes, usually a loud voice and permanently untidy hair.

“I can take a few.” She was speaking softly, but behind it was a rapacious outlook that made Ramiro think of the feral cats that roamed across the dump heap.

Ramiro made to walk away, he had said more than he normally would have - arguing was not in his nature, and he was not going to report on her.

“Don’t go away Ricky. Come back, I have to tell you something,” she called. Everybody called Ramiro, Ricky, although it was somewhat removed from his real name, and it was not his middle name at all. It was one of those things in life that are never adequately explained. The girl was still kneeling in a pair of blue jeans that was cut off at the knees; under one sharp knee she had secured an empty black plastic bag, her flip flop sandals nearby and she was wearing an old oversized t-shirt. Now that he had her attention, Ramiro decided to taunt her, making her think that he was seriously considering reporting her.

“I don’t want to get in trouble for this,” he said, still half turned away from her.

She ducked in the hole again and after five seconds appeared again holding her hands up, showing that aside for a few grains of sand, they were empty. “See I put it back. Now come nuh.”

She was now gently covering up the hole by pushing the sand in. He went to her and stooped to help, there were scores of eggs still visible and more already buried.

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“You would really tell somebody, Ricky,” her eyes were hopeful, her lips parted in what looked like a smile.

They called her Gayle. She was a few years older than he was, a fast talker and a born hustler. She was one of the children who lived on the beach that his mother did not like to see him hanging around, but the bigger they all became the harder it was to keep him away from their company.

“Ricky, you wouldn’t tell on me.” She insisted. It was not a question. He looked away, but felt challenged to let her feel his resistance.

“Of course I would tell.” “My old Auntie told me that turtle eggs are special food. Good for children….” “And will sell at a good price for people who like exotic meat….” Ramiro started to get up, but she pulled his arm and urged him to sit back on the soft sand. A very slight land breeze had picked up, causing the bag under her knee to rustle.

“Stay, Ricky. I have to tell you something else. My old Auntie Pearl who used to be here, you know her, told me a lot of things …Nothing about turtles. She is from Portland, you know. She was a real Maroon.”

Ramiro hesitated, but understand that she too wanted to be away from the empty night of their beach for a little while longer. He had no idea in which hut she slept at night – Gayle did not live anywhere as he did, and they never met at the bus stop when he was going to school or returning home.

He remembered the woman who used to sell jerk fish on the beach. Since she left, no one did fish that way anymore. They said it was just as well, as people did not come to their beach for fish cooked in foil. When she left, no one person became responsible for Gayle. His mother used to grumble that the girl was growing-up wild, in-between homes of people who were some kind of relative; but lately, her wanderings had gone beyond blood ties.

“That girl is drawing the wrong kind of attention,” his mother would mutter if Gayle appeared from the distance in an outfit that, even for her skinny figure, showed that she was twelve and not a little girl anymore.

Gayle rest her hand on his shoulder, compelling him to remain seated. She was telling him some kind of story. The moon was becoming stronger in the sky, she was interesting, so he decided to sit and listen.

“My Auntie Pearl says that far from here, the mountains are very high, the valleys go down narrow and deep, and if you are down there you can spend the whole morning walking through fine mist. Well, long, long time ago, way back when, she tell me about a

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girl who was a little different. She would just take off in the bush and you don’t see her again till you start to fret. Then you would just see her coming down the track with mountain doves for the cooking pot.

Gayle said that late one night, Nanny, her brother Quao, and friends Kofi and Yaw decided to leave their mountainside village in the night and go fishing in a lagoon. It was a night like this with a good bright moon, and they believed that big fish would come to the surface and bite.

It took them more than two hours to walk down the mountain paths that they knew well, but that were skillfully concealed from outsiders. Along the way they amused each other with jokes and riddles. They did not turn off the path to enjoy the many streams and small waterfalls that were nearby but instead focused on planting their feet firmly on the soil to avoid tripping on the thick tree roots crossing the walkway. At night, the forest was louder than in the day as that is when the crickets carry on incessant whirring and the pale lizards croak in deep conversations.

When the tall trees made way for fern and shrubs Nanny and her companions saw the dark sea glisten in silvery motion beyond the edge of the honeycomb rocks where they sought to drop their lines and tease each other about who would have the night’s biggest haul.

The children heard it together. Horses were coming from the South along the coast road. Although the bushes were right beside the road, on those rocks they were exposed, so Nanny and her friends stooped and ran for the bushes and they lay as flat as they could and did not move. The small group of men were armed, some of them were dressed in the uniform of the militia, and they some dogs ran quietly beside the horses. Bright moonlight was a good time to look for runaway slaves.

The children kept their heads almost touching the ground, grateful that at night the breeze came from down the slopes to the sea, and waited until the group was some distance away because the militia always had good trackers with them………………”

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Guard us with thy mighty hand

The party stopped and dismounted. One man stayed to look after the horses and the rest of the group disappeared into the fern and trees that fringed the coast road, very near to the path that Nanny and her friends used. There was no knowing when the men would return so it was not wise to stay until daylight, so the four children pulled in their lines and crept away from the watchman and the horses and made their way back across the road and up the mountain by another route.

As they passed down a dense path near where there was an old Taino cave, Nanny smelled a cooking fire.

"Ji nah," she whispered, which means "stand" in their father's language. The group stood and listened. Although it was some distance away, the pounding of seawater against the rock cliff of the lagoon came to them as deep booms; croaking lizards dared the approach of owls; there was nothing else for them to hear, but the smell of smoke was faintly there. After hearing nothing more, they made off even more carefully than before. Then, they heard a woman's moan.

Nanny held the hand of her brother and pulled Yaw and Kofi to her."The runaways found the cave," said Nanny. We must help them before the militia gets there."

"But Nanny, they have guns...." Yaw said.

"Yes, but He Who Knows and Sees Everything is on the side of right, which is our side. Yaw, it will be your job to stay here and listen. If we meet trouble run and get help from our elders. We will pray for your nanvti yeah, safe journey.

Like shadows, Nanny, Kofi and Quao stepped lightly through the dense bushes and leaves until they got to the cave. By this time the smell of the cooking was strong and there was definitely shuffling and muffled moans within the ancient cave.

"Agoo", called Nanny quietly, so that the persons inside were keeping watch would know it was an Akan person outside and not an enemy. Even the slight noises inside of the cave stopped.

"Agoo", called Nanny again. "Akwaaba", the reply meant that the persons inside were Africans!

Nanny slowly went inside of the cave, from low glow of a small firelight she saw a group of women and children holding each other in a corner. A small clay pot was on the ground beside the fire.

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She went to the oldest woman in the group, the elder, and knelt before her. "Mother, men with guns are near. You must leave now and come with us." "We are happy to leave but my granddaughter is hurt. If she moves she may die."She pointed to a young woman at the back who was crying and holding a pregnant belly.

"I can take her," said Nanny. "Mother, please go with my brother and my friend. They will take you to safety. We have little time."

"The Great One has sent you, so we must do as you say," said the woman and she gathered the rest of the group and were led off by Quao and watched from the rear by Kofi and Yaw.

Nanny felt the young woman’s hand, it was clammy. She was carrying a fever that could be deadly. She took up the small clay pot, left the cave and went in search of herbs. Near to a stream she smelled and found ginger, pulled up a root, washed the pot, and filled the gourd she carried on her belt with water. On a drier part of the hillside she pulled a handful of leaves from a clump of fevergrass.

Returning to the cave, Nanny boiled the herbs and urged the young woman to have a good draught of the weak tea. After a short time, the young woman agreed that she could travel along, so Nanny got to her to her feet and urged her to lean and start the long walk, slowly to her hidden village.

When daylight eased its way into the sky, Nanny and the young woman were still far from home and in the distance, Nanny could hear the men tracking their path, sensing which way they were, closing in. Nanny knew the danger of giving away the location of her village, so decided to go down a gorge and cross the narrow point of a river to the other side. That route led to even more rugged mountainside that had huge boulders, long ago pulled down by the force of nature and lodged until the next raging flood. Over the fertile soil and growing into every available crevice were bushes and vines and grasses and even trees. The tracks were hard to find here, but Nanny knew most of them very well. This route was their best chance to elude the trackers, but it did expose them at one point to extreme danger.

The young woman with her was trying to be brave, but she was clearly tired and in some pain.

Nanny lifted her on her back and made her way down the side of the gorge, holding on to anything nature presented to her – a low hanging branch, a firmly implanted rock - and carefully testing every step of the hillside before she firmly planted her feet during her treacherous walk. She got to the bottom. It was not yet the rainy season, so at the low point she could easily wade across the stony bottom. On the other side, the steep face of the mountain faced them. This time they would be fully exposed to the men with guns who were now on the bank they left behind. Still holding the young woman on her

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back, Nanny steeled herself for the strain of a climb.

She heard the leader give the order to load their weapons. She carried the young woman to a gray boulder that was perhaps as big as Nanny’s house and firmly lodged in the hillside. She urged the pregnant mother to lie down behind it for protection.

Since escaping from the plantation, the mountain had been her home. Nanny worshipped her God freely and privately there. She paused to do this now. Bending on her knees, her back to the hunters, she raised both arms up to the grey sky where heavy, grey clouds with ragged edges moved slowly down from the top of the surrounding ridge.

She called out, "Eternal Father, bless our land. Guard us with thy mighty hand."

The first cracks from the guns broke the peace of the valley. A wild boar she had not seen darted from its hiding place. A flock of startled parakeets left a tree as if on one pair of wings, their calls adding anxiety to the air.

The volley of gunshot travelled across the valley in the direction of Nanny, and with her upraised hands she caught two handfuls of them, and with a downward arc of her arms, she returned them, with full velocity, back to the men. She did this three times, then they stopped.

Some days later when the young woman gave birth to her baby, she whispered this story to her mother who told her to hush; then they prayed against bad thoughts.

Back on the plantation, being treated for shot wounds, the militia and their trackers also told this story. There was no disbelief, as they had the scars to prove it.

*****

Gayle stood up. The plastic bag that was slung around her wrist wafted with the slight breeze that was coming down from the hills to the sea. It was empty

“We can go back now,” she said.

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Chapter 2

The next day was Friday, and as usual Ramiro went to visit his father after school. He found him in the stables relaxing with the other grooms after that day’s exercises. An old man was writing numbers with a piece of white chalk on a portion of the wooden stable wall that was painted black for that purpose. Three other men stood looking at the numbers.

Two times a day, rain or shine, the numbers would run at Augusta Racecourse where his father worked. The complex had stables and paddocks that were home to between 15 and 20 horses. Some were being schooled for the racetrack, or had started a racing career. At the moment, there were a couple of breeding mares. Any day of the week was work as the horses needed round-the-clock care.

Ramiro saw his father snap his fingers and grin, "Me know the dead man and baby would work for me this time. Me never win with married woman yet."

The old man finished writing down the numbers, straightened up and looked at him. "Weh de paper deh boss? You can't collect unless you have de paper."

Ramiro's father reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a small scrap of white paper. "See it there; dead man four times, baby two times. Three, three, three, three, two, two. How much the Chiney man said that is?"

The old man took the paper and studied it. Then he counted out two hundred and seventy five dollars and handed it over to Ramiro’s father.

"You must play drop han more often Sawdust. See how you lucky." "I'm only lucky when I'm lucky," said Sawdust. “See my other luck here."

He touched Ramiro on his shoulder and then led him away from the group to a far stall. Inside, a young, dark coloured horse, Ramiro could not be sure in that light if it was dark brown or black, stood with his rump facing out. Ramiro read the name tacked onto a piece of card on the wooden post. It said "Call Me Thunder".

Sawdust spoke just above a low whisper, "From a farm in St. Ann and just turned three years. I get to school him."

Ramiro reached out his hand to touch the smooth, short hairs. His father grabbed his hand to stop him and said, "No, him is still jumpy. Him mus' trus' me firs' before him get comfortable with other people."

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Quietly, Sawdust slipped under the chain at the entrance to the stall and stepped on to the sawdust.

Call Me Thunder sensing a presence lifted his head and twitched his ears. Sawdust reached for the harness with his left hand and held his mane with the right, while murmuring softly at him. Ramiro's heart skipped a beat when he saw the horse rear up and snort, exposing his long teeth. Sawdust kept a firm hold on the harness forcing the horse's head to stay down, still whispering lowly. After a few minutes, Call Me Thunder quieted to the point where Sawdust was patting his rump without any remonstrance; he still kept clear of the hind legs though.

"Him goin' to be a champion Dadda?" "I feel so. Him have the strength and the attitude already."

Sawdust came out of the stall and leaned on the post, "You think about what I said the last time?"

“Yes Dadda. But Lilly said that anything that has to do with gambling is against God's will".

"So why does she take the money that I give you every week? Is gambling allow me to live. She is just looking for an excuse but I am going over there very soon, to tell her that you coming to live here. Time come."

Sawdust peeled off a some money and added the drop han' winnings he just received and gave it to Ramiro. The boy pocketed it and walked out of the stall to the street where he stood at the bus stop to catch the first of the two buses that would take him home, and to his mother. He moved away from two small schoolboys who were quarrelling and shoving each other over some matter that seemed to be of the utmost importance to them. One was slightly older than the other, but they looked like brothers. A woman called roughly to them, and, still fuming with each other, they obeyed her and disappeared down a lane.

The bus arrived and he sat near the back and used his hand to shield his face from the afternoon sun that came through the window. Ramiro thought, as he sometimes did, that it must be nice to have a brother or a really close friend like a brother. The gentle rocking of the bus and the warmth soon lulled him to sleep and in his dream he saw two friends who were as close as brothers, but they were fighting.

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Grant true wisdom

Bakkra Lynch smiled broadly and enjoyed the fight.On the stubby grass, at the edge of Lowgate cane piece, two small boys were struggling on the ground in a fight.

They were skinny but the tense grit of their teeth, and rough handling of each other, spoke of the intensity of their battle.

Sam, at the moment, was kneeling his elbow in the ribs of Boukman who was effectively pinned to the ground. Boukman managed to get his leg hooked into Sam’s supporting knee and gave it the hardest jerk he could. Sam cried out in pain as his ankle twisted and he reached to hold it.

Boukman jumped on him and pummeled the boy’s face hard. Sam managed to grab an arm and bit down hard on Boukman’s wrist. But at that point, a pair of thick arms dislodged the two and bore a crying Sam Sharpe away.

Annoyed that his sport had been taken away, Bakkra nevertheless allowed Brownie, the plantation’s brawniest worker to carry the boy from the angry scene. Bakkra instinctively looked into the face of Daddy Servius, the old African cart driver and one of the last original Africans on the estate, spurred his mule and rode away.

That evening in the village, the mothers of the boys had it out with each other in a loud tracing match. Dutty Boukman’s mother pointed to the scar on her son’s wrist caused by the wicked beast Sam; and Sam’s mother said that her boy was probably lamed for life because of a thieving snake. No one dared interrupt them, it was a way of letting off steam and letting go some of the venom that built up daily in estate life.

The following morning, Sam’s ankle was swollen and his mother pleaded with the headman that he get some days off for treatment at the slave hospital, which he agreed to, and Daddy Servius transported the boy there the following day.

Sitting with his back against the cool stones of the hospital foundation, Sam rested and tried to make sense of how he got there. Boukman was his best friend, how did they end up in that terrible fight?

They were both picking up short stalks of cane left behind in the fields and running jokes with each other. It was their game to each have his own pile and compare the height before Daddy Servius came with the cart to collect cane for the boiler house.

This time however, when they returned from picking up, there was one pile there instead of two, and each boy claimed it as his own. Sam threw a verbal taunt at Boukman, and Bakkra who was nearby laughed and said that Boukman was a likkle

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mawga dawg who will serve Sam forever. The words thrown, was the first blow, and the next round was with fists and feet.

The slave hospital was a peaceful spot on its own little rise far from the factory. It was made of dark cut stone and was cool inside. Fields of cane lands rustled and waved down the slopes from the hospital, and at the bottom of the nearby valley a thick grove of trees sheltered a small river that eventually led to the village where the estate slaves lived.

Sam counted the backs of all the workers that he could see in the fields – he went through all his fingers and toes about three times. He saw his parents and uncles and cousins and neighbours; then he counted the overseers – he could count all of them on one hand; then he looked for the sole man on horseback - Bakkra Lynch.

He spent a peaceful three days there, watching the workers receive painful treatments for awful injuries. He even sneaked off more than once down to the river, and then the cart came for him to be returned to his mother.

As soon as she had finished fussing over him, Sam limped to Boukman’s family hut. He found his friend sitting on his doorstep, looking at the old book that been in their village for as long as they knew. Boukman had always been fascinated by it, and that is how he got the nickname. He was happy to see Sam, and they both tried not to look at each other’s wounds.

“Bra,” said a voice. It sounded like a call.

Daddy Servius was beckoning to them. He had some curious ways, the old African, one of them is that he often spoke to them in his mother tongue, which none of them knew.

They followed him away from the houses, where the ground was hard and took them to the side of the road where they normally left produce for Sunday market. The ground there had a lot of loose dust.

Daddy Servius used a slim piece of bamboo, drew the web of Ananse and said: “The spider’s web is a mystical object. It looks so weak, but it is very strong, on it a spider can go in all directions to survive. The web teaches that life is not simple and needs examination and reflection. Accept that, and you will be on the path to true wisdom.”

The African had only learned a little of his people’s wisdom before he had been captured, bound and transported from his village as a boy. He decided that he was ready now to share what he knew.

*****

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The conductor nudged Ramiro to wake up. It was the last stop, the beach. He slung his knapsack over one shoulder, and rubbing his eyes, got off.

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Chapter 3

Before dawn the following morning, the long, low tone of a conch shell sounded across the beach. In the dreams of the slumbering fisher folk, it was like the pink rose of morning announcing a bountiful day. Another long blow roused Ramiro and he realized that his mother was already awake, moving around the room, getting ready to buy her take from the boats, which would be now pulled up on the beach.

He joined her and, holding their baskets, they hustled across the darkness to buy some of the catch. A small crowd was already gathered using battery and kerosene lamps to guide the pickings. He followed his mother’s instructions on which fish to pick as she haggled over the price of an assortment of about 30 fish, plus a Lion Fish which the fisherman threw in saying that if she scaled it properly, it would be one of the best.

As the morning light bathed the beach, a buxom higgler bellowed that she needed Ramiro to scale and clean for her, the first of several who were aggressively businesslike in their haste to get going about their affairs in the city. He got up and prepared his mind for a hectic morning while he sharpened his mother’s gutting knife. He was focused on his work, but Ramiro heard his father coming even when he was still some distance away.

The movement of the sea against the long stretch of fine sandy beach set the tempo of the soundtrack of that shoreline every day. Today the sounds, even at the shore, was barely there, just the occasional small wave breaking. More dominant was the call and response of sellers and buyers of fish, and of engines taking vessels back out to sea or engines taking vehicles off the beach and on to the road. A small flock of seagulls added rough cries, in between rapacious grabs at any fishy morsel thrown their way. Beside these normal sounds was the sustained approach of hooves on wet sand, announcing the arrival of a small group of racehorses out for morning bathing exercises.

Six horses with two riders crossed the sand and four entered the sea. Sawdust, sitting on a mare, was corralling Call Me Thunder, leading him closer to the water. The colt was resisting, he seemed unsatisfied with the halt, and wanting to prolong the run down the beach that was trafficked by boaters moving netting and motors and containers from the water to the land. Sawdust had been correct to stop them where he did.

Ramiro dipped his hands in the fresh water basin that he kept beside him, put the sharp gutting knife on the counter and went out to watch his dad, but at the same time was aware that his mother would be observing everything.

Sawdust dismounted when he saw Ramiro and called out to him to take the mare. He gave Ramiro a leg up and the boy easily directed her to enter the water and swim, with him astride. He looked back and saw his father walk the colt into the sea and, swimming himself, coaxed the horse to swim before mounting. For a short time, Ramiro and the

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other groom swam the animals to the point where the bay turned, went ashore and trotted them across the sand. When they finally tethered all six to sea grape trees and went into Lilly's shop, she was nervously kneading a batch of festival dough, pressing her upper body weight through the ball of her hands.

A delicious festival started out as a soft pale yellow dough sausage that gently floated in a pot of deep, hot oil, and that swelled slightly during cooking and turned golden when done. If it was under kneaded, the dough would break apart in the pot. You only knew if the dough had been thoroughly kneaded, but not over wrought, after the first bite. Would your teeth go through easily, or would it be a bite and tear experience?

Lilly’s kneading got more laboured after Sawdust greeted her, and she did not answer.

Sawdust did not move from the spot where he had stopped, just beyond reach from her. Although he had just been swimming, the sun and the breeze had almost already dried his skin, casing it in a nearly invisible film of salt.

He knew her well, and this was not going to be an easy conversation; but sometimes avoiding a fight can be beyond the ability of two friends.

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Chapter 4

"I'm taking Ricky today", said Sawdust quietly, as if he were calming another skittish horse.

"Why you so anxious to involve him in that reprobate life of yours?" "Don't be a hypocrite, like you don't use the money that I give him and send him to school"

"We can manage without you," she bit back. Sawdust hardened his voice, just as he had tugged on Call Me Thunder's bridle earlier, to demonstrate who was in charge.

"Manage how? Hardly anybody comes to this beach anymore, so you barely make anything off the cooking. Plus you think that this is the best place to bring up a boy?

“Look around you. Ricky reach grade five. Today is a school day and he is out here scaling fish. All the other children around here dropped out of school from grade three."

Lilly started to sob, "You are not taking my son."

Sawdust pressed on, "I done talk. Ricky, pack your things. Johnno will take back the horses to the stables. We will catch the next bus."

Nervously Ramiro stood and moved to the door. He barely saw when his mother grabbed the gutting knife and lunged towards his father. Sawdust raised his right arm to protect himself and the blade entered his left forearm opening a shallow wound from wrist to elbow.

With his left fist, he knocked her wrist, which caused the knife to fall to the ground and Ramiro ran and picked it up. He watched the blood drip from his father's arm to the sand and his mother cradle her hurt wrist. Unarmed, he did not think that she would not hurt him again, but he was still wary of her.

"Ricky. Go and get your things," Sawdust said. He eventually picked up a kitchen cloth and called the other groom to help to wrap his arm.

Ramiro saw that his mother was physically unhurt, but emotionally wrecked. She was crying and looking down. If she were to look up at him, even glance, and let him see her eyes through her tears, he would tell his father that he would not go. Sawdust, he knew, would not force him to go.

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If she would even keep her face down, but turn her eyes up so that he would see the whites and her dark pupils, he would read the message “Don’t go.” Lilly and Ramiro had been sleeping on the same bed almost every night for as long as he was alive. Sometimes they had no need for words, a gesture, an expression or a glance was more efficient than words.

“Remember your schoolbag,” Sawdust said.

Even after they were gone, Lilly was still sitting in her shop crying hard. She held her belly feeling the threefold pain of the children that she had lost.

Her first two children were born while she was a teenager living with her mother downtown. The father was a guy just out of secondary school, whose family had hit hard times and had moved into her yard three months before. She left both school and children behind to follow the life of dances and stage shows. To make money, Lilly preferred to take a dozen brassieres from a higgler and peddle them on busy streets, as it kept her in the centre of excitement. When Taneisha was two, and Conroy three, their father, who had in the meantime qualified as an automotive technician, told her that he was moving out to live with an aunt and was taking the children. Shocked, she quarreled and cussed, but no one supported her. She could only watch as her babies, cradled in the arms of their father, left in a taxi. At first she visited them regularly, but his Aunt was always hovering nearby and she never felt comfortable there. Three years later, the father settled with another woman and she saw her children take a back seat in that house after their first half sibling was born.

Lilly’s reached Bonny Beach because she followed her friends there one Easter holiday to a day party that went straight through the night. Lilly had fallen asleep sitting on the sand with her back resting on a cookhouse. It was the old woman who ran the house who woke her up and offered her a meal and she, having absolutely nothing else to do, somehow stayed on and helped the woman with her shop. That was twelve years ago. When the woman got sick, Lilly looked after her until she died, then just kept on with the business. It was hard work, and she never ever made a lot of money, but it was a stable life.

Lileth Henderson was 25 and Nelson Rodney was 21 when they met right on that beach. They were equals. He was an untrained labourer from the inner city who wanted badly to be in the horseracing business so he stayed close to the stables, willingly taking on the roughest work. He had no difficulty spending the night with sickly horses that needed round-the-clock care, asking only for extra sawdust to make his bed, and that is how the name Sawdust stuck.

She liked his optimistic outlook on life, he loved her cooking and in a few months, Ramiro was on the way. From the very beginning, although they never lived together, Sawdust did his part to ensure that Ramiro had good care. He carved out a portion of

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whatever money he could win or earn to make sure that his son had clothes and food and schooling. As he became respected as a groom, and his salary increased, he wanted to do more and now that Ramiro was ten, and nearly in secondary school, it was time to take over.

When Ramiro was born, Lilly was overwhelmed by another chance to recover her motherhood. She barely missed Sawdust when they broke up and instead devoted all of her attention to her son. Everything that she knew, which was precious little, she lovingly taught to Ramiro as soon as he was able to ask why.

She was convinced that her child was from God because of a dream about a boy that she had moments before she met Sawdust for the first time. She was dozing in her cookshop one morning in the middle of the week when there were no customers to serve. The sea breeze was not yet up and she had drifted off and had a vivid dream.

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Be our light through countless hours

Seven-year-old Paul Bogle huddled under the house alone, nervous, but not afraid. He had been there for some hours and now it was pitch, black night. Normally, at this time on a Sunday, he would have returned from evening service, and his mother would be urging him and his siblings and cousins to go to bed.

But there had been no Church service in Stony Gut that day. In the morning when the families were preparing the after church supper, the militia rode into the village, turned over cooking pots and demanded to know where recent runaways, Osonoko the Coromante; and Briton, who was born on the plantation had gone. No one knew - they said.

They were especially harsh on Kamina, because she had a history of being defiant. They put her to stand in the sun while they rode a horse through her house.

"Dem not here me seh!" she insisted, and the tone of her voice gave courage to the other villagers who refused to run into the bush and instead sat and kept their eyes trained on the militia men as they rampaged through huts and kitchens and vegetable plots and hen houses. Then they put Kamina into the cart first and ordered all of the young people, the adults and the elders, into to join her. They drove away - no doubt to the workhouse for punishment - leaving the children alone in the village.

Paul ran under his parent’s hut as soon as the commotion started and stayed there. He was hungry, but felt he could ignore the pangs and stay safe until his parents returned. He could not ignore the scared crying of the other children, especially when evening and its darkness came.

He crept out and found eight-year-old Phibbah in her mother's kitchen, shivering and frightened. The faint embers from the cooking fire, where a breadfruit roasted until it burned, were barely there. Paul went behind the house for some dry banana leaves, tore them up, blew on the embers and used them to feed a small flame. Phibbah placed a few pieces of wood on the flame and soon there was a small but steady fire, giving them courage in the dark, but he could not ignore the small voices out there that were crying, and also the voices that were silent.

In the night, Paul went from hut to hut, calling out and encouraging the children to come with him. He led them, many crying, to the flame in Phibbah's kitchen. When he had done that, Paul went out again into the nearby bushes, calling out the names of the children he knew. In all more than 20 children eventually huddled together in the kitchen where they roasted fingers of plantain and ate them.

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The night was long, but they held each other, and Paul led them in the singing of songs from Church, "In this world of darkness, so we must shine. You in your small corner, and I in mine." The songs fed their courage.

Comforted, the smaller children drifted off to sleep and the older ones told Ananse stories. They heard how the spider man used his wits to stay alive and to look after his own family.

When all the stories were told, the firewood finished, and only red embers showed through the ash, only Paul was awake. He listened to the breathing of the children and their somnolent shuffling until daybreak, which was when the cart returned with the weary adults. Despite being away all of Sunday, they would have to work again that morning in the fields, or miss a day’s pay.

The parents were relieved to find that all of the children were safe together and praised them all for their bravery.

When Phibbah's mother asked them if they were afraid, she said, "No Mama, our Paul was our light through countless hours."

*******

Lilly’s dream must have lasted mere minutes, as she was still sleeping lightly when she distinctly believed that she smelled the horse sweat from her dreams. She raised her head from the counter and opened her eyes to meet the steady gaze of a young man who was looking down at her, amused. It was Sawdust, who had been a part of a group that had brought racehorses out to exercise and had directed him to order some food.

Sawdust was dressed in an old polo shirt and cut off jeans and old sneakers. All Lilly saw, was a tall, very fit young man with a face that seemed kind and honest. Even though at the moment he was dirty and sweaty, she noted that he had a low haircut, was clean shaven and had strong white teeth. If he were not with the grooms she would have thought that he was a soldier or a policeman.

“Why you frighten me so?” she reproached him. “What a do?” Sawdust had said, smiling even more. She liked the soft and calm tone of his voice. It relaxed her even more.

Lilly was not fat and not slim, not tall and not short, she wore her natural hair in a bun at the back of her head. She was self conscious at being discovered, sleeping, by him.

“You could make some noise in the place,” she said, checking herself to make sure that her blouse and skirt were in their right place. She turned away, pretending to be

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getting busy for the kitchen, but in truth she was making sure that all the remains of sleep were wiped from her face.

“You have any roast breadfruit?” he asked.

Lilly turned to look at him thinking how strange it was that he asked for the same food that she just had in her dream, and even more amazing, that she actually had one that she was saving for the weekend crowd.

“I can put one for you on the fire now while I fix up some fish. How you want it?”

He gave her the order and then kept her company as she prepared the meal which he thoroughly enjoyed.

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Chapter 5

As they settled into Sawdust's rooms that night, Ramiro raised the matter of his mother with his father.

"Who is going to help Lilly?"

Ramiro has shared almost every single day of his life with his mother, sleeping on the same bed and sharing thoughts and conversation on most things except any matter that did not happen on the beach. He did not even know where she was from. When he was with his father, Ramiro tried to fill in the blanks that were left out of conversations with his mother. With Sawdust, Ramiro felt comfortable to talk about many more topics, but his father had no time for exploring feelings.

"Your mother alright, Ricky. She knows how to take care of herself, and you will see her when you want. I want you to focus on making more friends. There is a football club near here that has a league for your age, and I will take you to the paddock and you can learn how to be a groom like me. I not saying anything against the beach life, but the cookshop thing is not going anywhere. It is a dead end, so put that life behind you."

Ramiro was not sure he was any more comfortable lying alone in a bed behind concrete walls - sleeping and waking to the sounds of competing street dances straight through the night into daylight; instead of lying beside his mother, quietly discussing whether the wind coming in from the West meant a sign of bad weather.

Nonetheless, he found himself captivated by his father and thrust himself away from his mother’s gravitational pull that had kept him in a steady orbit around her until now. Now he saw how other families lived and he even adopted some of their routines such as doing homework at night, watching the evening news, visiting the shopping plazas after school, wearing ironed clothes, caring for and using a fridge and a bathroom.

Many of his friends had a church lifestyle that seemed fun and interesting. There seemed to be a lot of singing, theatre, brain games and sporting competitions, visits to other churches, debates and study; but he could not participate as Saturdays were race days and on Sundays he and his father were just too tired – but he thought about experiencing a church lifestyle one day nonetheless.

In August, after he had lived with his father for three months, his father changed his routine from looking after several horses to caring for only one. The horse that the owner and the trainer and the grooms in his stables believed was the most amazing talent to be bred on the island, Call Me Thunder. The colt was being schooled and conditioned to do his first run on Independence Day. So far, all of their work was being done in secret, and if all went well, they dreamed of him surpassing the achievements of

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the legendary Streak of Light who collected all the major trophies for three-year-olds some thirty years ago.

The trainer came that Sunday morning to collect Sawdust and Ramiro to take them to a farm where Call Me Thunder would run for the day. Also in the pickup was Briggy, the loudmouthed heavyweight Jockey who was decked to ride him in the St Leger on National Heroes Day. The farm was only an hour’s drive away, and Call Me Thunder seemed calm after they let him out on the grounds and saddled him for a day of paced exercises and for him to become accustomed to Briggy being astride. Ramiro was given one of the retired racehorses to run alongside him.

The farm was about an hour’s drive away on the flat plains in the south of the parish. They put in a lot of work in the morning as the afternoons were prone to heavy showers which would ruin the ground for good flat running. They were very pleased when the caretaker told them that it had not rained for the past two days, and that conditions were dry.

After his first hard run, Sawdust checked Call Me Thunder for injuries, and then put him in a paddock to rest when he noticed a figure standing under a guango tree to the side of Amazing Power's horsebox. He approached him from the rear and grew angry when he recognised the person as Lance Lodge, a heavyweight jockey who the racing commission had long suspected of race fixing, but had never had enough material for a conviction. In the past few years, two promising mounts had mysteriously become injured after he rode them in big purse races.

"Lodge, what you doin' here?"

Lodge, slowly and deliberately shifted to glance at Sawdust, then glance away again. "Wha'appen man? You keeping secret round here." Sawdust did not answer him, Lodge continued, "Chungy promised that he would get me another big horse to ride. I should mount this one."

"Forget it, he is already decked."

Lodge shrugged, "Is Chungy’s horse. I will ask him."

Sawdust planted his legs firmly on the ground, crossed his hands over his chest and said in his low and low way, "Lef' the place Lodge. Nothing nuh deh here for you today."

Lodge hissed his teeth and walked towards the track, "Is your farm bwoy? For a manweh share bed with horse, a lucky you lucky to get dis work."

Sawdust grabbed Lodge's collar from behind and slapped the back of his head, but

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Jockeys were notoriously nimble, and he hooked one of his muscular legs in between Sawdust's leg causing him to lose his balance and they both fell to the ground. Now having cancelled Sawdust's advantage of height, Lodge used his knee to ram into Sawdust's belly, and when he flashed his knife, it was more than a bare threat.

A lone gunshot nearby stopped the commotion. A stocky man in a worn leather hat, lowered hand from pointing in the air where he had fired the shot. It was Chungy, the owner of Call Me Thunder and of the farm. Behind him, the trainer, Briggy, and Ramiro, were running towards the scene.

"Why unno a kill off each other 'pon me farm!"

Lodge got up first and said, "Chungy, Is look me come look for you, and dis man a order me off your farm."

"Lodge me tell you when I ready for you, I will call you. This place look like any damn tourist attraction weh people feel dem can come and go as them like?"

Briggy who felt the most threatened by the presence of the other jockey jumped into the fray, "Lodge, since you can't get horse to ride is what? You tun agent 007? Or is the FBI you working for now."

"Shut you mouth Briggy", said Chungy. "Lodge go wait on me on the verandah."

Lodge dusted himself as he walked off. Chungy called the trainer and the two of them drew away to speak in private close to where Call Me Thunder was standing in the shade.

Sawdust hung his head down as he was still in pain from the blow from Lodge's knee. When he spoke he said, "We are going to have trouble with Lodge. If he can't ride Amazing Power, he will make sure and mess up his chances."

"You think Chungy will deck me out?" Briggy sounded worried. Sawdust shook his head carefully. "Not with this boy. Call Me Thunder is too talented to put in the hands of a jockey who does not love horses. Chungy knows that."

Call Me Thunder was entered into the following Saturday's nine-race programme and Ramiro barely saw anything of his father as he put everything into his work to ensure that the horse performed well on his debut showing.

On the race day, Ramiro ate the breakfast that his father had left for him, then he walked to meet his father at Chungy's stables at the Augusta Racecourse. For the past

29

week, Ramiro watched as his father groomed the horse with a currycomb then brushed his coat till it shone. It was a regular Saturday race day, but for the team the place crackled with excitement. Call Me Thunder’s muscle and skeletal development was so far advanced that Briggy, a heavyweight rider, could mount him.

Their race was the fifth. From the third race, Sawdust walked Call Me Thunder to the parade so that the punters would see him. There were plenty exclamations as eyes saw Call Me Thunder's body for the first time, and calculated how he might perform that day. The filly Restless Babe was the sure favourite, but the rest of the field was soft. Punters marked him for a quintilla, a bet where you pick win and place. “That Call Me Thunder look razor sharp,” said one punter, leaning on the fence. “These big juice horses look promising and then they let you down on the back stretch. I will hold my money on today and just watch him,” said his friend standing beside him.

At another side of the parade a female punter exclaimed, “Why this horse wasn’t in the 2,000 Guineas? If he runs as good as he looks, this is what I come to see.”

At the starter's gun, all seven in the gate had a good start for the 5-furlong (1000m) race. Briggy, wearing Chungy’s black and green colours, was nervous. When the horses came around the bend the crowd saw when Amazing Power bunched up his forelock muscles, and held the curve to emerge ahead of the pack. He did not have the experience though to adjust his gait for the straight, and the experience of Restless Babe showed through as she gathered her hooves and propelled herself ahead of him, by under a length, to the winning post.

Sawdust was satisfied. A win would have been great, but Call Me Thunder needed to build his own ambition to match his outstanding athleticism. He believed that the horse had the willpower to win, and together they would bring out the champion within. Chungy and the trainer were there in the winner’s circle ahead of him, laughing and congratulating Briggy on a solid maiden ride. Now they would enter him in a few more run-ups to the test of the best, the Jamaica St Leger.

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Chapter 6

Three months had passed, and Lilly had not seen Ramiro. At first she told herself that he had had only another eight months to prepare for his secondary school entrance examinations, and had no spare time. The holidays brought more business every day on the beach and Lilly worked hard and tried not to face the possibility that her son did not want to visit her badly enough – and she was too disabled by the thought of that hurt to find the courage and the energy to woo him to her again.

Lion came by for a late lunch that afternoon and he stayed back afterwards quietly reading a magazine. He finally put it down to take out his wallet and pay for the meal, and saw that she was doing all the chores by herself.

"How your son these days?"

"Him all right. I pass by his father's house sometimes, and his father says that he is doing better in school." "You don't see him?" "You know boys. He is on the school football squad…."

"Lilly, you go to such extremes. Six months ago you would not even let him have a pack of playing cards. Now you have let go completely."

Lilly pulled away from the conversation and went outside to the back of her cookshop to privately wipe a tear from her eye but encountered Gayle slumped in the shadow of the hut on the soft sand.

“Gayle, is what you doing sitting out here?”

The child was looking wilder than usual; unkempt some would say. If Lilly had not looked across the dune she might have thought that one of the stray dogs that were always roaming the beach had been sleeping in the shade.

“Me just looking a little firewood."

Lilly thought that Gayle was growing into a good liar. She seemed so sincere, but no one collected firewood behind the dunes, you collected them from the shore where they were washed up. She was about to ignore the girl again, then wondered what would happen if a group of unattached youth, who were now too common on the beach, were to see her.

“Come here to me.”

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Gayle got up and came over easily enough. She had long outgrown the blouse that she was wearing, but she had deliberately not completely zipped up the front of her jeans shorts. Her hair was not combed and the overall condition of her hair, skin and nails made it seem that she had not taken a bath recently. Despite this, she had a very carefree air about her and as usual, wore a smile. Lilly thought that she reminded her a little too closely of her younger self.

“You hungry?”

“I could eat something, yes.”

Lilly told her to sit on a crate right there at the back, and she served a bowl of fish tea for the girl, then left her to attend to some customers who just walked in. After eating, Gayle noticed that the water container was empty and she offered to fill it at the standpipe. After that, she willingly cleared the tables and cleaned up, working her way into another meal by the end of the day.

“I can come back tomorrow?” she asked Lilly. Who nodded. “How is Ricky?” “Him alright.” “Him gone for good?” “Gyal, stop pester me with too much question. If you want come back tomorrow, mek sure yu come early so you can help me out.”

Gayle ran behind a dune before Lilly had finished speaking, and Lilly returned to her regrets. Lion was gone but he left the magazine on the counter, and under it was the payment for his lunch.

When she had cleaned up, it was still daylight, so Lilly sat in the shade behind her hut and looked at the cover. On it was a black and white drawing of an old fashioned, young man. He had heavy sideburns and was dressed in a jacket and a shirt with a high collar. She knew about him, it was George William Gordon, one of the National Heroes. Lilly had often admired his eyes and thought that he must have been a kind man, so she leafed through the magazine until she found a page with another picture of Gordon, and there was an article. She was glad to have the rest of the afternoon to enjoy reading about him.

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Chapter 7

Stir response to duty’s call

Mr East tapped gently on the mahogany door of his boss’ office before opening it and going in.

The room was large and dominated by a huge carved desk and matching chairs. The varnish gleamed in the bright room which was shielded from the direct rays of the morning sun by a wooden lattice that covered the windows facing the sea.

A side table was piled with rolls of maps of properties all across Jamaica. Beside that was Mr Gordon’s writing desk – called a secretary. Bookcases, a strongbox safe, and an end table for refreshments, completed the furnishings.

Mr Gordon was describing a new plan that would advance the subdivision and sale of land, and the two men of means were seated across the table from him were leaning forward, almost drooling with dreams of returns on investment.

As discreetly as his leather soles could be on the bare wooden floor, East walked over to his boss’ side of the table and said something softly in his ear.

“Mr Gordon, your father’s messenger is here."

Without hesitation, George excused himself and saw the messenger in an ante room next to his office.

The messenger handed George a note, which he read quickly. His father was asking to see him at the Myrtle Beach Hotel after his luncheon. It was not, as George anticipated, a polite request for money. George scribbled a reply and handed it back to the messenger, then told him to wait a moment further.

When he and East stood outside of the room, George told his man to count out a sum of money and dispatch the messenger with it in an envelope.

As the Custos of St Andrew - the first citizen of that parish - Joseph Gordon was extended particular courtesies by the leading hotel in Kingston including a nook in the lobby that was reserved for his use. Here he could be seen yet have private conversations. On George's approach, the elder Gordon stood and shook his son’s hand.

This hotel had been their meeting place ever since George opened his own office in the capital. Despite his success as a businessman, his father’s status made him more welcome here then he might have been if did not have that close blood connection.

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In addition, George’s father’s home was out of bounds to George, and he preferred not to visit his father’s offices like any other businessman or tradesman. His father would see him immediately, he knew, but his father’s office, and the former slave system that it used to represent, filled him with resentment. After asking about his son’s health and general well being, George’s father explained his request for the meeting.

“George, you have been very kind to my wife and I in ways that we will perhaps never be able to repay, but I nevertheless find myself in the situation where I have to sell the estate near Mavis Bank and my home in Cherry Gardens and move into a smaller house. I have found a suitable property in Barbican Pen. I wanted you to hear it from me first.”

A wave of anxiety caused by nostalgia rose up inside of George’s heart. He thought that he was beyond any pain and embarrassment from his past, but he was surprised that the very idea of selling Mavis Bank brought him close to tears. In his memory, Mavis Bank was the paradise where he was born and where his closest family members went through public embarrassment as enslaved people. He had not seen the property for many years, but the idea that the most beautiful place on earth was being removed even more firmly away from him dimmed his senses, and in a moment he was transported back in time to a cool morning when he was about seven years old and his mother was calling him and his sisters and brother from their beds to breakfast.

She had prepared cornmeal porridge on an open fire under the shade of a guango tree that was not too far from the great house. The children sat on the ground at a safe distance from the pot and waited for their bowl of hot, sweet, morning goodness. Around them, other residents of the plantation were sullen and silent as they and their children made their way to work in the fields.

Gordon and his sisters and brothers were favoured above all the slaves because their mother had borne the master’s only children. They did not live in the great house, but his mother’s quarters were far better appointed from the others and they always had more than enough rations.

In addition, as his mother was a house slave and they were privileged to walk through it. They knew every room, while other children knew the shortcuts to the boiler house.

That memory led into another where he was in his father’s study, standing by his desk, while his father read words that he did not understand, but that nevertheless touched him deeply. “Fairwell to others but never we part. Heir to my royalty, son of my heart,” Gordon senior read, and then put a book in his son’s hands.

When he was ten years old, George stopped working at the plantation altogether because he was sent to live with a godfather several days journey away, in Black River, a coastal town on the other side of the island. He never saw that house in Mavis Bank

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again because his father married, and George’s mother and her children had to leave the plantation.

George’s sister described how they piled every single item of clothing, bedding, kitchen ware and furniture in the back of a cart, and that their mother sat proudly beside the driver who was hired to transport them into the city of Kingston. George’s mother did not flinch from the mocking words that the other workers threw at her and her children at the public lowering of their status.

The city of Kingston was a very good place for a family in their circumstances. There was work for anyone who wanted it on the ports, in trade services, or supporting professionals in the law, in finance and in entertainment. Still enslaved, their life was as any free, landless urban dweller, so when slavery was abolished, life continued as usual for them.

George’s mother used the only skill that she had, and she became a respectable community cook dishing up breakfasts and lunches for the working people who lived in their yard and along their avenue, and heard all the hot gossip of the street.

When he relocated to Kingston from Black River, George had an easy time fitting in. His mother was very well connected to the rhythm of life in the city, and knew just what went on at street level.

His father, at that time, was not only a prominent lawyer, he was a member of the legislature and also the Custos Rotulorum of the parish of St Andrew. When George started his own business, his father’s connections gave him entrée into high business and political society. He had the best of both worlds being able to move seamlessly among all the Creole groups on the island.

“…so this is your opportunity to take the seat,” senior Gordon said. George had completely missed the last few minutes of his father's address.

“I beg your pardon Custos?” said George. He was always very formal with his father.

“Surprised that I would back you?” his father said slightly amused. ‘Sir, you have shown yourself to be as excellent man as any in the Kingdom, and therefore the world."

Using his fingers, Joseph Gordon counted-off his son's virtues.

"You have established yourself as a sound man of business; oh yes! I have heard that you and your good friends plan to start an insurance company. It is an excellent idea that will keep money that is made in this island invested here.

35

“My colleague tells me that you are negotiating sale of land in St Thomas to subdivide and re sell. That will bring more land into the hands of hard working people and allow them to prosper as peasants.

“You are a man of God, though I cannot understand why you have moved away from our Church.

“You have elevated your mother and sisters and set their feet on the path to secure futures. My financial fortunes, as you know, are greatly diminished, but I do have substantial political influence, so with your permission, I wish to put your name forward as the political representative of the people of St Thomas-in-the-East, where I know you already have significant land assets.”

“But I am just twenty and two…” The words came out of Gordon’s mouth even as he saw that politics would be a very effective vehicle to advance his ideas.”

“How is your mother?”

“It was a question that the elder Gordon asked whenever they met, and George had always said, as he did now, “Sheisdoingwellthanksforasking.”

“I tried to do the best by her George. I hope that you see that; but true respect for all the people of Jamaica will never happen until more native people, like you, become the leadership of this country. Will you offer yourself for nomination?” Gordon senior's Scottish pragmatism was strongest when he was brokering a deal, a trait his son adopted for himself.

“You honour me, sir," said George. "I will consult my associates in the parish and here in Kingston and the capital Spanish Town and let you know in short order.”

The two spoke briefly about other matters of mutual concern and shortly afterwards, parted company.

George did not immediately return to his office. He stopped at his solicitors and gave instructions that they make an immediate offer to buy his father’s Cherry Gardens house, so that his father and stepmother could continue to live in their home. By the end of the day, he had made up his mind to accept his father's support and vie to be the assembly man for the people of the parish of St Thomas-in-the-East.

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Chapter 8

Lilly decided to take a break from work the next day. She took all the money that she had hidden, and stood upwind from the collection pile and waited on the first available bus that could take her downtown. This was the first time that she had left the beach in months. She usually got her supplies by paying another vendor to buy things for her, or she patronized the tiny grocery shop in the settlement.

A darkly tinted coaster bus stopped, and she boarded what turned out to be a mobile listening lounge. Peak hour traffic had already gone, but a handful of the passengers were happy secondary school children who were also travelling into town on that bus.

It was dark and the lively music was intensely loud and carried a deep, bone-reverberating bass. Lilly thought about asking the driver to turn it down, but the children were enjoying the dub so much that she decided not to start a commotion – and suffer their insults, which would surely follow.

The first settlement from the beach was a single file of buildings behind high fences along the shoreline. These were short time hotels. The bus stopped and collected a tired looking woman with high varicose veins in her legs. Lilly thought that she was a maid, as the sex workers took taxis.

As the bus approached the Causeway Bridge, Lilly noticed that what was an area where a few fishermen would pull up their boats and sell to customers by a long standing arrangement, was now a village of hovels that had pushed away the mangroves. They were on either side of the road, so she could not rid the images of the hardness of their lifestyle by looking across the road. She reasoned that people have to live.

She alighted from the bus at the terminal point, and almost immediately had to jump out of the way of a wooden cart that was being pushed through a narrow space at great speed on small wheels that were handmade from old tyres. The driver was transporting barrels of goods the wrong way up the road.

Lilly squeezed her handbag more tightly under her arm as she casually walked and looked at the gaily coloured clothes hanging from stalls along the street. It was still early in the day for serious selling, so the vendors were sweeping around their stalls and sprinkling water to keep the dust down. Many more sellers were in the wholesale stores, preparing for the weekend.

The streets outside of the market area were a row of shops, all of a similar design. They were brightly coloured on the outside with a small, dark storefront inside. Expanded metal ran from the ceiling to the top of the counter, separating the public from the goods and the store clerks. There was one small door, also made from expanded metal;

37

that was fitted into the metalwork. As soon as the goods were paid for, a clerk opened that door and inspected the receipt before pushing a bag of goods and returning the receipt into the hands of waiting customers. Lilly jostled until she got her shoulder touching the expanded metal, and from there she had a good view of all the goods that took up every available space on the walls behind the counter. This store specialized in ladies and children’s clothing and haberdashery. After three minutes of gazing, Lilly was ready to place her order.

She caught the eye of a clerk and quickly called out ‘Number 15!”

The clerk used a mop stick to reach for a three-pack of ladies shirts and brought them down to place on the counter on her side, then she took out one of the shirts and held it up so that Lilly could see it better. Lilly liked the colours and of the three, one could fit her, but not the other two. She would take it.

“I taking those. Mek me see 17,” she said.Up went the mop stick again and returned with some striped boys’ ganzies. She did not like those, so asked for another number.

When she was through with her order, the clerk wrote the numbers on a slip of paper and pushed it through one of the spaces in the grillwork, and told her to go pay the cashier, who sat behind the section of the counter that was completely blocked from the customers by sheet metal. There was only a small space at the bottom for the money and the order paper. Lily pushed the paper and the money through the space and received her change and a receipt. She went back to the counter and waited again until she could get the attention of the clerk and push her receipt through the expanded metal to her, and wait.

In no time, the expanded metal door opened and an arm holding the black plastic bag came through. Lilly saw that the correct goods were inside. It was a system that kept everyone safe.

It started to rain at that point and Lilly decided that it was time for something to eat. She then went around a corner to where she knew a patty shop had stood for decades and squeezed in-between legitimate customers, and the peddlers, and others who were sheltering from the rain in the store piazza.

Lilly rested her bag on the counter and blew on her hot patty, cooling the meat inside until she could take a safe bite. She ate the patty and washed it down with box juice while she watched the busy traders going about their business. When these people needed a break, they came to her beach.

The rain and her patty finished around the same time and, although it had been a good downpour, Lilly had no problem walking about the city. The rainwater quickly

38

run off so walking around was easy, and the traffic signs and signals kept the busy movement of pedestrians, cyclists, motorists, push carts and the odd donkey cart, in order.

She went back into the market area and bought a pack of hair then cut a deal with two women who assured her that they could give her a nice braid in two hours. She was put to sit on a three-legged stool on the sidewalk, and in between naps, she listened to their chatter and watched people go by as in dexterous harmony, they braided her hair.

For so long all the conversations that Lilly had with the people around her was gossip about other fisher folk, and conversations centered on what was happening in their local level politics. These women were learning from each other as they spoke of their own businesses, of stories of the activities of their children in and out of school, of developments in the life stories of their friends and neighbours. Both of them were also doing courses. The one on the left was learning practical nursing and the other drapery making. They and also spent a lot of time bawdily supporting their favourite dancehall heroes.

When she returned to the beach that evening, Lilly put her things in her small house and wandered to the beach until every ray of sunlight had faded and only the short lived blue of evening remained. It was a new moon and the night would be the darkest dark.

The last of the visitors were coming out of the water and drying off. The other cookshops were serving their final meals, and when they were gone, so too would all activity on this beach cease. No entertainment could happen out here at night, as there was no electricity, and all of their activities centered on the amount of light that came from the distant heavenly bodies – the moon and the sun. This was a beautiful, peaceful place, and although their care of nature’s creation had not been good – they had to live.

*****

The day after that was a Friday and rising early, Lilly put on her new clothes and went to Sawdust's house, which was a rented half-of-a-house ten minutes walk from the track. He and Ramiro were both still there. She knew that the yard had no dogs, so came through the gate and called through the grill.

Shirtless in shorts and flip flops, Sawdust opened the grill for her.

"Hello Nelson. Ricky wake yet?"

Sawdust looked at her cautiously, "Him just getting ready to go out."

"Good I not spending long." She stepped past him into the house. "Ricky?"

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Ramiro came out and blinked when he saw Lilly. He had never seen his mother looking so pretty. She gave him an extended hug. It was a long time since anyone hugged him and he hugged her right back. It felt good.

"I hear you doing well in school. You don't think your mother wants to know?"

Ricky cast his eyes down. "It's just that I'm kinda busy right now."

"No, my dear. I can't have a son like you and don't see him. Right, Nelson?" She gave Sawdust a challenging look.

"No. Ricky, you must go and look for your mother. You have to find time for her." At that moment two boys came into the yard and called for Ramiro.

"Anyway, I did not come to take up your time today. But I am looking for you soon, soon. Before the end of the holidays, right?"

"Yes Lilly," Ramiro said.

Lilly took out the pack of three men’s dress shirts that she bought in the wholesale the day before. You had to buy a minimum of three, and the pack had three different sizes. Sawdust watched Lilly carefully, saying little. He was not sure of her motives. When Lilly asked Ramiro to see which of the three shirts would fit him, he left them and went alone into his room.

Sawdust’s front room, which served as a living/dining space had a small dining table, which had some of Ramiro’s school books and some racing pools and brochures at one end, showing that it doubled as a study for them.

There was a flat screen television at one end of the room, and grouped around it was a small couch, an armchair and a standing fan, which he switched on.

“Nice to see that everything is all right, Nelson,” she said. She had thought about how to approach the matter that was on her heart, and at this moment, risked the pleasantness of the visit to say exactly what was on her mind. “I need to know what is going on with Ricky. I don’t have a phone so he should come and look for me sometimes.”

“You can visit him anytime you want, like you are doing now.” “I don’t want to take him away Nelson; and I am not saying anything now about whether racing is good or bad. Ramiro is a decent boy and I brought him to this point.”

“So what are you asking for?”

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“He should spend a weekend with me, once in a while – maybe during holidays, and I would appreciate the help.”

“I’ll talk about it with him.” “Why not me? Will you turn him against me?”

“If you are not here, he can really decide if he wants to go. I won’t pressure him either way.”

Ramiro came out in the light blue shirt. He said it fit fine and Lilly departed. Ramiro’s friends watched her walk out of the yard. One of them said in awe.

"Ricky. Is your mother that?"

He heard the admiration in the voice, and felt his heart swell, "Yes, That is my mother. She has the best cookshop on Bonny Beach. I going to spend a weekend with her soon."

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Chapter 9

Gayle was already leaning with one foot on the cookshop wall, the other foot buried in the soft sand, when Lilly and Ramiro got to the cookshop on Saturday, the first time that mother and son had been together since he left. Ramiro enjoyed going to the track, and this was the first that he had missed since living with his father, but he was content to be with Lilly that morning.

Lilly’s bliss, on the other hand, had been bruised; on her way to the cookshop, she saw one of the casual dresses that she bought for Gayle tangled in the scrub, already discarded.

She could barely muster a greeting when she saw the girl, and her thoughts instead focused on the negative influence Gayle would have on Ramiro. She wondered if she had made a mistake by reaching out to her.

The customers came early during the holidays, and the beach and its cookshops were busy in the morning, so when a team of four persons with laminated ID cards and digital tablets asked for a moment of Lilly’s time, she brusquely turned them down.They moved away, promising to return later when it was quieter, and Lilly called Gayle to her.

“Find out is what them say them want.”

She was suspicious of teams of people trolling the beach wearing IDs and making notes. They invariably wanted people like her off the beach, but she and the other occupants had resisted them before, and would resist them again.

The team of government people appeared in her shop around mid afternoon. Lilly was serving, and Gayle was assisting with cleanup in-between chatting with Ramiro. Lilly told them that she could not talk to them at that time, and they were about to turn away when one said that they could wait until she was free.

He received hard looks from his colleagues for making them work overtime, but he seemed to be in charge so they had no choice but to comply. Lilly shrugged, and went back to her work keeping a close eye on the two children, straining to hear their conversation over the hiss of the frying pan.

When they had finished for the day, the government people came forward and introduced themselves and their business. The leader was Ginger Clancy, and his colleagues said that they were the implementers for the removal of all commercial activity from the beach, as it was protected as a nature reserve by law.

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The offer was that the occupants join a programme, along with the vendors along the Causeway, and relocate to a new location in Portmore, or to go to the Greenwich Town or Rae Town fishing beaches.

Lilly despised their politeness, as she knew that they were sent there to sow lies. “You want to push us off this beach because you have the property lined up for one of you friend dem.”

Lilly had sat through scores of meetings over several years on matters concerning her community on the beach.

“Our Member of Parliament does not agree that we should move, so you will have to talk to her first,” Lilly said. She was confident that the group would immediately understand the folly of opposing the community that the MP relied on to have a core of unwavering support. “Well you see Miss Lilly,” the persistent Clancy said, “She asked us to come here and get this done. Think about it. A place where you have all the facilities that you do not have now. Sanitary facilities, regular collection of waste, electricity, legal tenure.”

“But the people want to come here,” Lilly said. “So who will run this beach?”

No one answered and then Lilly realized that the children were no longer nearby. She walked a few steps out her door and relaxed to see that they were chatting and lounging in the shallows, not too far away.

Lilly’s experience told her that if this girl continued in her current lifestyle she could be a regular sex worker in less than a year; and that her son was the better off living with his father. She also knew that whoever was approved to occupy Bonny Beach would make a lot of money, and it seemed unfair that the fisher folk and cookshop people, who created something out of nothing, and who made the beach a popular hangout, had to be the ones to lose out.

She took a flyer from Clancy and said that she would think about it.

Clancy and his team walked back to the parked cars, where they parted company. He switched on his headlights and waited on the others to make their way through the densely packed cars that carried families and couples to the beach for a relaxing sea bath and early evening meal of fresh fish.

Although the place closed at dusk and that there were no social services, the cookshops here attracted people from all across the island. It was proof that the food was good and the environment hospitable.

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The woman was right, there was a development consortium that was very interested in the property, and lease arrangements were far advanced.

Clancy’s mind recalled a story that he had heard long before about how the civil rights leader, Marcus Garvey, said “Chance had never satisfied the hope of a suffering people”, and it gave him the resolve that changes had to come to the lifestyle on this beach for any lasting progress to happen for the area in general.

Clancy saw his colleagues drive away, but he stayed where he was as he wanted to remember the story that an old Garveyite told him happened in 189__ . The Garveyite said that he grew up in St Ann’s Bay, and that the postmistress, who knew everything that happened in the town, was his grandmother and that she told him.

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True Wisdom

Marcus closed the gate of his parents' yard and hustled along Market Street. The bag of marbles at the bottom of his capacious shorts pocket clicked softly, keeping time with the pace of his jogging. On any given Saturday afternoon, boys would gather at the side of the printery, and if Marcus selected his challengers carefully, he could increase his cache by at least a third. He never left the outcome of anything important, like a game of marbles, to chance.

It was a typically busy afternoon in the market town of St Ann's Bay; and even more so as the harvest season was nearly over and people had money in their pockets. Two ships were at the docks being laden with sacks of raw sugar, while the crew enjoyed a few days in the town. He watched as a loader man hauled fresh fruits and vegetables from a mule-drawn dray parked at the corner with Market Street. When he pulled up the brake for the cart, the driver got down and knocked on the side gate of a hotel. A woman emerged and joined him on the sidewalk and haggled over a price for his produce.

Marcus stayed on the side of the road and allowed a drover with a small herd of goats to cross before him – he was cautious as rams were known to buck. Marcus decided that when he crossed the road, he would buy an otaheite apple from the driver of the fruit cart.

A motor vehicle honked incessantly urging the goats to hurry along. The driver did not wait, but instead made a wide arc to negotiate the corner; he could not see the dray around the bend, and when he did, he could not brake in time. A fender clipped one of the mules. It reared and kicked at the motor vehicle. His hooves actually hit the driver’s shoulder causing him to completely lose control of the vehicle and crash in the brick wall of a doctor's office. The mule lost his balance and if he were still not harnessed to the cart would have fallen over with all that was in it.

There were ample hands to lift the driver inside for help. He was holding his shoulder and seemed to be in extreme pain. The mule got up and looked all right until his driver urged the team forward and it refused to put one of its back legs down. The driver whipped him and it pulled its share of the weight limping on three legs.

"I would have been at that spot a few moments later," Marcus reflected as he looked at the damage. The crashed car, the limping mule and some wasted vegetables that slid off the cart during the melee.

Marcus was more aware of his safety during the remainder of his walk. The carts and horses and animals and bicycles and pedestrians were more than enough for the narrow streets of St Ann’s Bay, but the motor vehicles and their lack of agility made traffic more

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dangerous. He could only imagine what the streets of busier places like Montego Bay and Kingston were like.

****************

Marcus had a successful afternoon of marbles and ended the session with two heavy pockets. On his return trip he passed the mangled motor vehicle that had been pushed on to an open lot. Later that evening there was the report of a single gunshot; his father, who had been reading the national daily newspaper, mumbled that it must be the vet putting down the injured mule.

Mr Garvey settled his folded newspaper on a side table as Mrs Garvey came in to serve dinner.

Marcus took up his school slate and started to write. After Church the next day, he was still scribbling and erasing and rewriting on his slate. By afternoon he was satisfied and asked his father to read his thoughts.

After Mr Garvey read the short passage he said, "Interesting son, a real vision into the future. What do you want to do with it?"

"I want to print it and circulate it to the custos, the pastors, the magistrates, the Governor..."

"What about sending it to the paper son? A letter to the Editor."

Marcus got a sheet of clean writing paper, his pen, a nib and his school ink and, in his best handwriting, wrote:

The Editor Sir,

The industrious people of St Ann's Bay are suffering from the benefits of mechanical advancement. Motor vehicles can be seen every single day on our narrow streets, which can barely serve the needs of man and beast. All too often it is the reason behind awful carnage where we intended only faster and more efficient transportation.

Only yesterday, the hard labour of an honest farmer was wasted when a motor vehicle critically injured a trusty mule which suffered greatly before it was put down. That farmer may now have to incur debt to replace the mule and perhaps deprive his children, of schooling and his land might be under utilized. That very same motor car would have killed me. Sir, had my steps been only a few paces faster, I too would have been a casualty of that disastrous incident.

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Chance cannot satisfy hope in this country. We cannot rely on luck, we need to put our God-given intellect to create laws that regulate how motorised vehicles must travel on the roads. These laws should address speed, caution in going around corners, and perhaps which roads must be out of bounds to them. With the power of the automobile, must come additional responsibility on the operators; and those drivers will only respond to binding laws.

Marcus was about to sign his name, but at the last moment felt shy, and instead signed it 'A Youth'. He carefully blotted the ink, folded the letter and placed it into an addressed envelope. His father would mail it at the post office while he was at school.

*****

A week later the letter was published and it stimulated discussion in the marketplace and rum bars of St Ann's Bay. Later that week, the Baptist pastor's topic was "The law, God's protection for the people".

Over the next month, other letters showed up on the pages of the newspaper discussing the issue of traffic. A few were skeptical of laws that restricted travelling speed, which they saw as a personal freedom. Others cited a new law in England that restricted the speed of locomotives travelling through built up areas; and that it was only a matter of time before similar regulations came in for motor vehicles.

Marcus read them all and only wished that he had signed his full name; but he was also sure that there would be other times, and other issues, on which he could express his twelve-year-old mind.

*****

Clancy started his car and drove away.

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Chapter 10

Lilly liked the lady who came to visit her and talk about relocation from the beach. She was very patient with Lilly and spoke just like she could be the owner of a cookshop. Lilly had just shown Gayle how to place, light and sustain a flame in her makeshift coal pot – a motor vehicle tyre rim. When it was fully lit, she would put on a breadfruit to roast.

The relocation lady explained that the government programme would allot her to a one bedroom apartment with a three year lease. The first year is rent free. They would help her to get a bank account and she would be eligible for a range of other social intervention programmes.

“Where would I work?” Lilly asked. “All I know how to do is to cook and to sell fish.”

“Any of the restaurants near here would want a good cook. You could check them,” Clancy started, then saw her face sour as she thought about the line of hotels nearby.

What he was saying was that she would stop working for herself and find a job, any job. Clancy got up and said that he would come back later.

The woman asked Lilly if she wanted to rent a one bedroom or two bedroom apartment.

“Well is me and my son...,” then her eyes drifted to Gayle who was fanning the flame, as she had been taught by Lilly.

The woman made some taps and swipes on her digital tablet and then spoke.

“We have no record of a parent or close blood relative for twelve year old Gayle Smith. The court will place her in a children’s home, or if she is lucky, she will be fostered by a family.”

“I am her guardian,” Lilly said. She wanted to think that the words talked themselves into existence, that she was not responsible for them; but even so, she knew that she wanted to protect this hard of hearing girl that she cared about.

“Don’t say not a word,” the woman said, and they discussed it no further.

Lilly saw a coin half buried in the sand and she picked it up. On one side was the head of Norman Manley – the only person whose image appeared in profile on the local money, all the other faces on coins looked straight ahead.

The relocation lady had been working on her tablet, but now she urged Lilly’s attention.

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“Alright. I want you to go through everything that I have here to make sure that you agree with it, then if everything is ok, you will sign and everything will go through smoothly.

“Is your name Lileth Nichelle Henderson and you are the mother of Ramiro Christopher Rodney, age nine and guardian of Gayle Smith age 12?”

Lilly hesitated, not because she was undecided, but because she was overwhelmed with the feeling of joy to be a parent again – for the fourth time. Behind it, there was sadness, as she knew that two of her children were growing without her proud eyes on them. Having Gayle would never fill that void, but she believed that it would feel good to selflessly care for someone else.

“Yes,” Lilly simply said.

“Sign here please,” said the lady, passing the digital tablet and a stylus. “We will give you a hard copy of this document by next week.”

As the lady packed up and went away, Lilly mindlessly rubbed the coin in her hand. She looked at it again, intending to put it in her pocket when the face seemed to turn to her, and the two eyes looked straight into hers and the face gave a gentle, smile.

She felt her body dissolve from the spot in her cookshop, and reform at another where she was standing in the shade away from a bright sun outside, but she was standing on green grass beside a small group of serious looking men and boys.

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Justice, truth be ours

Archdeacon Simms, the headmaster of Jamaica College, tapped his fingers on the table, but was otherwise still, even his breathing was slow and low. A wave of warm air blew into the open-sided tent, and with it the chatter and laughter of the few hundred spectators who came out to see the first renewal of the Jamaica Schools Championship at Sabina Park.

Around the table were the school's sports master, other house masters and the head boy. Also there was the school's star athlete, Norman Manley who was recovering from winning the heats of the Class One 100-Yard Dash by drinking a tall bottle of water. The sports master finally spoke, deliberately measuring each word to match the importance of the moment.

"Overall, Headmaster, we are in third place: nine points behind Wolmers, five points behind St George's College," he tried to keep his anxiety in check, deliberately not looking at Norman. "There are three events left to go. We can, at best, place third place in the Long Jump - that is one point - and that is an event that will widen the gap between us and the leaders. Mr Manley is the favourite for the 100-Yard Dash finals, which will be five points for us. The best chance that we have of taking the championship home to Old Hope Road is to win the 4 x 100 Relay. Headmaster, we need to field our very best sprint team."

A loud cheer swept the wide expanse of the grounds and both men looked to see that the Wolmers spectators had renewed their energy and were gloriously waving their maroon and gold flags. Their athlete just won the Class-One Long Jump, pulling them further away from the pack.

Sitting in trees or on carts or simply standing around, hundreds of citizens of Kingston who had taken the afternoon off to watch the sports day were also reacting with excitement. Near to the Jamaica College tents, men and boys hailing from Half-Way-Tree, Matilda's Corner and straight up to Mona and Gordon Town patiently waited on their next opportunity to bruk out – as they expected Manley to lean forward and finish first place in the finals of the 100-Yard Dash.

The first staging of the athletics meet the year before had gone exceedingly well and was so completely covered by the press that the renewal was highly anticipated by the entire city. Even members of the exclusive Kingston Cricket Club, whose grounds they were using, had left their plantations and offices to enjoy an afternoon of sports. Everyone had his or her favourite team, but they all came out to support the boys.

The headmaster considered Norman. This boy was the single most important reason for their sporting achievements last year and also these games. Aside from his own personal achievements, he motivated the boys to push their own expectations of

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themselves higher, and to embrace discipline and effort. At this moment, the weight of the school's success at these games rested on his 17-year old shoulders.

"How would you select the relay team Manley?" Headmaster Simms asked.

"Sir, I think I could run a leg..." Norman started, but was interrupted by the sports master who growled through his teeth.

"Yes, yes, that is a given assumption Manley. Who else?" The man was nervous.

"William Scarlett on the first leg; he is fast, but he cannot chase. Francis Beckford on the last leg; he flies when he gets the baton, but can also lose focus and drop the baton during a pass. I will run third and plant the baton in Beckford's hand."

Norman paused because the real reason for the anxiety was his decision on who would run the second leg and pass the baton to him.

"Hugo Taylor Grant to complete the team, Sir."

"Why do you not have the island Class 2 champion, Kingsley Millingsworth, or our mile runner, the big Beckford brother, Louis?" The Sports master wanted to know.

Norman replied: "They are good strong runners sports master, but I do not know how they will perform in the relay."

"Explain that Manley," The headmaster ordered, but also continued. "Millingsworth and Louis Beckford have performed marvellously for this school. They have helped us to collect medals in cricket, shooting, boxing, they are True Blue boys and always willing to serve. Why won't you have them on your team?"

"They did not come to training, sir; Taylor Grant did," Norman said simply. "It is because of him we always had a full side to practice baton changes and know the abilities of every leg of our team. It is fair that he gets the chance to run for J.C today," Norman ended quietly and firmly.

His Headmaster without pressing too much, rejoined: "Son, the entire J.C. community wants this win and are depending on us to make the decision that will be in the best interest of the school. I want you to also think about that Norman, but the final decision we entrust to you."

Norman straightened his back and met every gaze under the tent. "I am motivated by my school's prayer: Create among us the spirit of comradeship and loyalty to one another. When we are called to rule, make us rule with justice. That is my guide for the decision to give Taylor Grant the second leg, sir."

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The announcer called for the finalists in the 100-Yard Dash and Norman left the tent.

He took his place behind the whitewashed starting line. He wanted the championships win as deeply as anyone else in the school, so he had to stay in the moment and do his best to win this race. The other five boys at the starting line were fast, but Norman decided to put them on the offensive by leading from the moment the gun gave them their release.

It was a clean start and Manley heard the boys to his left and to his right breathe and stride with determination; but he pushed harder, stayed relaxed, and burst the tape for his school. Not staying for the result, Norman jogged back to his tent, beckoning the relay team over as he did.

The rejected runners - Millingsworth, Louis Beckford and his father, old boy Louis Beckford Sr were there along with a handful of other old boys.

"Manley, the old boys said that it is too close to play around with a victory," schoolboy Louis Beckford said. "I know how to change baton with my brother, I can run third and you can do the second leg."

"We can't distract the team now gentlemen. We have a good team for J.C. that we are going to run," Norman said.

"You going to deliberately lose," said Millingsworth, "And for what Manley, to spite us? We were doing other activities for J.C. and you know it! Don't play around."

The simmering merriment of spectators outside just then burst into bubbling shrieks and excitement. The sports master ran into the tent with the widest smile of the day.

"A national record! Manley, you ran the 100-Yard Dash in ten seconds flat. It's official!"

Norman nodded and pulled his relay team away from the hubbub; he would celebrate later.

With one event left to go, the points standing had Wolmers in the lead with 26; St George's second with 24; and Jamaica College with 17 points. Their only chance of the championship was to win the relay and hope that the other two front runners did not place.

The starter's gun found Scarlett off the line first, just as he promised. He ran a beautiful leg and handed the baton ahead of the others and safely into the hands of Hugo Taylor Grant. Although he got a good lead and anyone watching could see that Hugo put his

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whole heart into his duty, the legs of the Wolmers, St George's, Potsdam, New College and Mandeville Middle School boys left him behind. Hugo plodded on, his eyes locked into those of his captain Norman Manley, filling those unforgiving moments with every ounce of running effort that he could muster. Only when Hugo was one stride away did Norman, in blind trust, turn his back leaving one arm outstretched, palm open. When the wooden tube was solidly in his hand, Norman closed his fingers around it, and then activated his limbs into action, focussed on closing the distance that he had been given.

When Norman passed the baton to Francis Beckford, only two teams were left to pass; Norman had regained third position for JC. Robert managed to clip all but the man from Potsdam.

Nervously, the Sports master and Beckford Sr added up the points. Jamaica College, 24; St George's 24; Wolmers 26. They were disappointed; but the referee was calling the Jamaica College Headmaster over. The official count added three extra points to Jamaica College for achieving the new 100-Yard Dash record.

Headmaster Simms wanted Norman to be at his side when he received the Olivier Challenge Cup. Sir Sydney Olivier agreed that he should share the triumphant moment, so they waited and watched the public have their fill of the boy, carrying him on their shoulders, the hero of a great day of sports on the dusty grounds of Sabina Park.

**** “You come back Miss Lilly,” said Gayle.

Lilly panicked. What could Gayle have seen?

“What you talking about? Come back from what?”

“You daydream. I see you stand up like you thinking very deep. The lady give you serious things to think about. I hear that you moving off.”

Gayle said this quite clearly, but she was indeed very scared and very sad and preparing herself for another separation and to be on her own again.

“Yes Gayle, we spoke about some very serious things. I told her that you are coming to live with me and Ramiro, but I never got a chance to talk to you about it first. How do you feel about that? About the three of us being a family.”

The girl was trembling and looking at her feet the whole time, but answered.

“I feel good.”

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Chapter 11

It became a busy summer for Ramiro. His mother needed him in her business, and his father wanted extra help with Call Me Thunder. For himself, he did not mind the days out at sea, nor the early morning run around the track. He was available to ride exercise horses and Chungy paid him a smalls for it!

Aside from his occupations, the biggest change was sharing his living space with his mother as Gayle started sleeping in their house and in his bed, so the new arrangement saw him on a new sponge mattress on the floor, covered with a sheet.

He did not mind too much as it was fun sharing stories with her and making plans for when they would be moving off the beach in the near future. She had started going to some classes in preparation for going to a school, and although she complained that the homework was hard, it was clear that she was quite proud that she would soon be a real student soon with all the trappings of a uniform and a schoolbag and fretting about examinations.

From time to time, Ramiro would also get in trouble with one parent, or another, when he sneaked off to do something else with his friends. His mother suspected gambling at the off track, and his father thought he was idling with layabouts on the beach. He did do both, but many times, he was at the library waiting on his turn to use the Internet, or playing a ball game of some kind.

The day of the Jamaica St Leger came and Call Me Thunder’s team members were more than cautious, they were motivated. Over the period, the horse had made six successful starts and won five races. This was the longest of the standard annual races, that they called classics, and only a few of the local horses could be eligible for the first class lineup, but the talent that was there that day, was good.

Ramiro was a part of the team for the race day preparations. Chungy had bought Briggy new silks for the event – his same green and black, but there was a green dragon in the back of his shirt. He said that Mrs. Chung had designed it.

As usual, Sawdust was inseparable from Call Me Thunder before the race. His job was to keep the animal healthy, as well as calm and focussed on performing at his peak athletic ability.

It was a big race day and the Augusta Racecourse were full as almost every available horse was on the day’s schedule of races – the atmosphere around the Jamaica St Leger was like a festival.

In the stables precincts, Lodge was looking for racing glory as well. He was decked to ride a horse called Double Six. The only reason that he got that chance was that the

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horse was a visitor from another island and the owner did not know the detailed reputations of the local jockeys; he just heard the racing statistics for Lodge and that he was available. Lodge however had more than preparing how own horse on his mind. He made to leave the stables, but instead hung around in a concealed spot near the stable until the opportunity for his intent arose.

Little Kirk, a stable boy had come out of the stable to tip out some stale bedding from the stalls. Lodge followed him until he turned a corner into a deserted part of the complex, then called out to him, "Little Kirk, you still in the vet business?" He was referring to the time that Kirk was suspected of doping a horse for an owner. Lodge had actually seen the drugs in his bag, but chose not to say anything at that time, preferring to call in his cards later.

Kirk looked around nervously then said softly, "Hey Lodge. What you saying man?"

"Nuttin. Just getting ready for my race. But listen, I have to look into something this afternoon."

Little Kirk breathed heavily, and said nothing.

"Yeah, Kirk. I need you to give a message to a man for me. Just before his horse goes into the parade, I want you to tell Sawdust that Chungy needs to see him urgent." Little Kirk laughed. "You know that Sawdust not leaving his horse for nothing man. Could be his own sick mother calling him…" Lodge cut him short.

"Could be your mother calling to you from the other side of the penitentiary.” He said that very close to Kirk’s face with a very clear threat. “Don’t come to me with no argument man. Just make sure and find a way to get the man out, but just before the parade. Don’t forget." He walked off leaving Kirk shaking.

Ramiro was frustrated. There was no way he would get to watch the race today. It was so crowded and because he had to stay near his father he did not have a chance to secure himself a good lookout early. Just then, the cooing of pigeons caused him to look up. Of course, the roof! If he climbed up there he would have a view of the starting and finishing posts, but not the turn. That was good enough for him!

The stable had high concrete walls and roofed with corrugated metal that was held up by iron girders. On one wall leaned a ladder. Ramiro looked around. His father would probably object, but he was settling Call Me Thunder to drink some water. No one else was in the stable at that moment. He climbed the ladder to the ledge that was separated from the roof for ventilation. Then he carefully angled himself so that his hands were on the roof but body still standing on the ledge. This was the dangerous

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part. If he missed he would fall backwards some nine metres to the ground. He hoisted himself to the roof and walked along the ridge where the roof formed an angle. It was hot through his shoes, but it did not bother him as he was used to running barefoot across the noonday sand. He settled where a tree overgrew the roof giving some shade to watch the race.

He saw Lodge loitering just out of sight of the door of the stable, and then he saw Little Kirk returning to the stable pushing an empty wheelbarrow. There was nothing strange about this scene. Ramiro saw when the two men barely nodded at each other and Little Kirk went inside the stable.

Three minutes later his father ran from the building towards the direction of the parade. Ramiro was frightened. Something must be terribly wrong. When he saw Lodge walk purposefully into the stable his blood ran cold. As Lodge entered, Little Kirk walked out and just leaned on a wall outside. He could not see Ramiro behind him on the roof.

Ramiro wondered what he should do? As quietly as possible he crept back along the roof and lay flat on his stomach where he could see almost all of the inside of the stable through the space between roof and the top of the wall – but upside down.

From that point all he could see of Call Me Thunder, was his head. Then the horse shuffled and he saw Lodge emerge from that stall wiping his hands against his trousers. Lodge quickly walked out of the stables and disappeared in the opposite direction to where Sawdust went. Lodge remained outside. The whole episode took all of five minutes.

Ramiro carefully made his way down the ladder to Sawdust's stall. The horse looked OK, but Lodge must have done something to him. Anxiously he stood watching, as no one but the groom and trainer was allowed to touch the horse unsupervised. He did not want to leave Call Me Thunder alone again, but his father would not come. He heard the announcer call for the seventh race; the one Call Me Thunder was scheduled to run. After watching him for ten minutes he still seemed fine to Ramiro, except that he was fretting slightly about the front right leg.

Taking a big risk, Ramiro nervously entered the stall. He took the leg into his hand and noticed that a piece of wood with a nail going through it was lodged in the hoof. Ramiro took out his knife and opened it. If Call Me Thunder stepped heavily on the foot or worse, reared up and landed again, the nail might be driven into the soft part of his hoof and he would be injured. Not a moment was to be wasted. He pushed the blade under the wood and slowly worked it in the space in between the hoof to rock it out. It slowly eased up on one side then he had to slide out the blade and work the other side.

"What the hell are you doing Ramiro?" his father said in an angry whisper.

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Ramiro leaned back to show him the wood, "It almost out," he replied. Then with a last wiggle he prized the wood loose and it fell softly on the grass lining the stall. Ramiro backed out leaving his father to gently inspect the hoof. It was safe. Sawdust took a few moments to touch his son's shoulder before rising and silently led Call Me Thunder out to the parade where Briggy was anxiously waiting.

When horse and rider were on their way to the starting gates, Sawdust told Ramiro that Little Kirk had given him message that Chungy needed to see him urgently in the parade. He was not even there.

At the starter's gun, Call Me Thunder came out of his box with tremendous force. By the fifth furlong however, the tourist Double Six, ridden by Lodge, had the lead on him. Sawdust was not fretting yet. He knew that his horse was superior in the turn; and so he was. Call Me Thunder caught the inside lane and churned up the sand ahead of his field to catch the straight with a lead of a full length. Lodge raised up a little out of his saddle and pointed Double Six's head directly at Call Me Thunder's flank. He employed the whip on her hide and gave the bit a sharp tug. She snorted and charged ahead, her hot breath catching Tootie Rooti’s right flank, and slightly distracting that horse. The spectators leapt to their feet. Will a jockey take a tumble today? This was too close.

Briggy locked his thighs even closer to Call Me Thunder's back willing him to concentrate on moving ahead, "Don't mind them boy. Gwaan, Gwaan."

Three furlong's to go and Double Six charging in agony from her tightened bit and bleeding flank had positioned herself just a neck behind Call Me Thunder. This was the most exciting race so far for the day. The punters had been divided between the two horses. Call Me Thunder had strength and was on his home track, But Double Six was already a popular Superstakes champion who was at home on several turfs and was partial to no riders. She ran her own race. But today was difficult, and in the stands, her owner was silently raging against Briggy’s treatment of her.

Double Six loved to run ahead of the pack, but when she fell behind she tended to run outside of her leader's line of vision saving her energy for the last two-furlong blast. Lodge had positioned her out of Briggy's line of vision, but the control he was exerting over her body was sapping the vital energy that she needed for the final push.

Seated beside her owner, her trainer shut his eyes. He had seen willing horses in the prime of their careers face a rider like Lodge. Even if she won, Double Six would never give her all to a jockey ever again.

Call Me Thunder won by a head to the roar of the spectators for a race well run. Sawdust greeted him with a hug and looked around for Chungy, who was curiously not around. A tall stranger wearing a tan leather Stetson strode towards him and addressed him.

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“I say. That's a mighty fine colt we got there. Yessiree."

We? Sawdust's mind raced along. From where he stood, his eyes searched for Chungy or the trainer. They were nowhere. From behind the foreigner a short blonde teenaged girl, not more than 13, in tight blue jeans and a blouse with fringes grabbed the man's arm and said.

“Daddy he is just beautiful. Thank you."

Then Sawdust knew that Call Me Thunder had been claimed. Chungy had put up the horse to silent bidders just before the race. This gave him the opportunity to clear his money on the horse, win, or lose. This stranger must have given him an offer that he could not refuse, for Call Me Thunder had a promising career ahead of him, even before winning this race. It was the way things were at the track, and even in this moment of victory, Sawdust thought that sometimes he hated this business.

As the groom for Call Me Thunder, Sawdust had a nice payday. He took out Ramiro for a nice meal and then they went home to enjoy total relaxation. While they were there, he looked at his son watching the television and realised that he did not want Ramiro to grow up to be beholden to anybody. He had to admit that perhaps Lilly’s way of running her own business was a better example. As he sat thinking, his cellular phone rang. It was the foreigner's voice on the other end.

"Is this Sawdust? Good. My name is Tyler Taylor, owner of the Longhorn Thoroughbred Stud Ranches proudly located in Texas. That colt you groomed, Call Me Thunder, is in the best condition as I have ever seen a horse. I have a proposition for you Sawdust. I am a registered owner with Churchill Downs Inc. and race my horses all across our great United States." He chuckled. "I also keep my membership open here because from time to time this little country has produced some amazing talent for me."

His voice got serious. "I want you to come and work for me. Now don't say no just yet. Why not see me tomorrow at the track. It has to be in the mornin', as the missus is sending the jet for us in the afternoon."

Sawdust leaned back in the couch. A trip abroad would mean that he would be separated from his son just when they were getting close. He knew about the plans for relocation, so there was no fear of him returning to live on the beach, and this was the opportunity of his dreams; Churchill Downs meant a shot at the Kentucky Derby.

He thought of Lilly and how he was appreciating the changes that he was seeing in her. She was making all the right moves to plan for a more secure future; perhaps she would see that through and that would free him up to make this big decision.

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He also had to think that Ramiro would soon be a teenage boy who he knew had needs that would only be satisfied by a present and active father.

Sawdust left school very early, and had to grow up quickly, to support himself while he was still a boy. He knew that children can be responsible, and smart and brave and make good decisions, but that is not the best way to grow up.

He remembered his journey to becoming a groom. He grew up near a farm in Hanover where in his spare time he helped the grooms who cared for the polo and show jumping horses. Early on, he realized that he liked to work with the animals, but was more drawn to racing horses. He heard about a stable near the Augusta racetrack that might want a hard working boy who knew about horses, and he saw this as an opportunity to advance. Fully aware that life would be hard, and he might not get through on the first try, he told his family goodbye, got on a bus, and presented himself in his best attitude to the surprised head trainer who sent the boy straight back to the country. He did see how Sawdust handled himself around the property for the few hours that he was there, and told him he could return during the holidays.

That was his break, that was his grand adventure, and now he could be on another that had a very good chance of substantial financial reward.

‘What that you watching Ramiro?” he asked his son. When there was no answer, Sawdust realized that his son was fast asleep on the couch.

His interest for the show started as the scenery seemed very much like where he was from in the parish of Hanover. It seemed to be a feature on National Hero Alexander Bustamante. Sawdust decided that he must watch some more. Busta, whose original name was William Clarke, was born in his parish, Hanover.

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Strengthen us, the weak to cherish

The rain was coming down harder now, and William pressed Señor into a canter. He still hoped that the ford between him and Lucea was still passable despite the rain, but the small crowd ahead told him that it might already be too late.

The ford was small, but notoriously prone to flash flood, and at the moment the water would be knee high for his horse. William made his decision and urged Señor through the cool stream, feeling the willing animal lose his footing more than once on the gravel that was also in motion beneath the water. They claimed the other side, and without pausing, William touched his heels into the horse’s sides and they continued their brisk journey to the parish capital, leaving walkers sheltering under banana leaves, waiting on the water to subside.

Reaching his work, where he clerked for a dry goods store on the wharf, there was a small group of people at the counter, and the proprietor alone behind it.

“Good, you reach, cause nobody else don’t turn up as yet,” the owner said, which meant that William had to do bookkeeping, and also serve the customers that morning.

The owner promptly walked out, to conduct his business down on the wharf.

William had wanted to use the first few minutes to unpack his sack of soaked clothes and hang them up on the rafters, but instead went to the flour stores to fill the first order.

He was excited that today he would be going aboard a steam ship to Central America and satisfy his yearning to live in fabulous places and use his wit, intelligence and strength to create an exciting life for himself.

He settled Señor in the stable near to the store, taking time to give him a thorough rub down with a blanket, put some grass in the stall. William already had lined up a buyer for Señor who expected the horse to be delivered in the afternoon; but before all of that, saltfish and grain had to be weighed and sold. It was a busy day because every time William went into the storeroom, the bell on the front door would ring as someone else demanded attention.

By lunch time, the weather had deteriorated and the shoppers stopped coming in. William shut the door to keep out any rain that might blow in. If a customer came, they would ring the bell. He hung his clothes on the rafters to dry, stretched out on some sacks and promptly fell asleep to the loud splash of water exiting the guttering and hitting the concrete piazza.

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A small sound just outside the wooden store wall woke him up. William opened his eyes in the dark storeroom and listened again. The rain had held up, and he could clearly here a child complaining, and then the sound of a bottle breaking.

William went around to the front, opened the door and looked around the corner. Under the eve of the building, a man was trying to take away a cloth bag from a small girl who was resisting him. The unmistakable thick drip of honey was seeping through the bag.

“Hey, leave the girl alone!” William demanded. The man quickly looked William up and down, and ran off behind the building where the backyard gave way to bush. He was not in the mood to fight a strong man who was more than six feet tall.

“Come here little girl. What you doing out here. Why you never ring the …..”

The child was about ten years old, but short, and she was looking into the bag, vexed.

“I come to see if you want to buy some of my honey,” she said. “I had five bottles, but one break, so is only four now.”

Feeling slightly guilty for shutting the front door, William led her into the shop where she allowed him to take the sack and clean off the remaining bottles.

“I see when you and the horse swim cross the river this morning.”

“You were out there?”

“If I never jump, the mud would splash me. I had to turn back and come over the hill to get here.

William looked at the child again, in this weather, the detour would have added a few hours to her journey.

“So why you had to come today?”

“My father sick sir, and my mother send me to sell this and buy some medicine to give him.”

William decided to buy all the honey from the girl for the shop and also footed the bill for the broken bottle himself.

“In this rain, you not going to reach home tonight.”

“I know the way very well, sir, and I don’t believe in no duppy.”

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William thought, however, of the man who tried to rob her, and he decided to take her home.

His boss would be upset at the store left closed, but he was going away tomorrow anyway. He left a note to say that there was an urgent matter and he had to leave.

William went out and bought the medicine, then saddled Señor and put the girl on front and set off. The sun mid afternoon was now out causing every water droplet it touched to sparkle like a crystal. It would probably rain again in a few hours, so it made sense to act with haste.

He knew that going through the ford was now impossible, so allowed Señor to gently and carefully walk along the narrow hillside pass. After a while, this passage became too treacherous for a horse, so he tied him to a tree in a safe place, and they continued on foot.

Her home was, as he expected. A small, unpainted wooden house set into a stony hillside. Two dogs rushed out at them barking aggressively, and a few chickens were scratching at the roots of the plants around the house. A baby was playing on the front step with a toddler.

The girl went immediately inside the house, and William waited outside, carefully watching the guard dogs, wondering if he should leave. Then a young woman came out.

“Thank you for taking Maybell home, Sir. I was worried about her and the river.”

“She is a brave little girl. How is your husband?”

“Bad sir, but the medicine will give him some rest. We give thanks.”

William placed the money for the honey in her hand. It was used to hard work. If her husband was so bad that she had to send her small daughter across many miles in bad weather, who knew if he would get better soon. How far could money for a few bottles of honey support the family?

The woman thanked him very carefully, and William knew at that moment that no matter how far he travelled and who he would encounter, he would not meet more human dignity in adversity than this family. Jamaican people must be among the best in the world.

On impulse, William told her that she should could go into the town the next day and ask the livestock trader for a donkey that Mr Clarke had left for her. He then took leave of the family and returned to Lucea.

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When he finally parted with Señor that evening, William went to the donkey trader, paid him for the healthiest female on the lot, and told him the name of the woman who would collect her.

He thought of the determination of the little girl called Maybelle who could not get his attention because she could not reach the bell.

“Do something for me tomorrow man,” he told the seller. “Tell the woman that this animal will be a very reliable help for her and her family, and that she must name her Belle.”

*****

Sawdust decided that he would meet with Call Me Thunder’s new owner tomorrow morning, listen carefully, make no commitments, and say that he would have to talk things over with his family first.

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Chapter 12

It was dusk when Ramiro alighted from the bus on the road near to where his mother lived. Her street was very close to the main road, and he hailed the group of idling youngsters at her corner. He also greeted the delivery man outside of her gate who was putting sealed plastic containers in a large ice chest in the trunk of his car. He collected orders for an uptown deli.

Lilly was comfortably sitting at her kitchen table with her digital tablet, catching up on the latest agricultural and market news buzzing on her social network. She would get up soon to begin preparations for her food stall at a party tonight.

Ramiro greeted her, then knocked on Gayle's room door.

"She just went out”, his mother said, “I just sent her down to Sirgany Beach to pick up some lobsters for me. This afternoon a higgler on my social network posted photos of a catch that came in this afternoon and I reserved a few. I also posted that I will have lobster patties this weekend and my regular deli placed an order. “

Ramiro put down his school bag and went back out into the well-kept government yard where his mother was a tenant. There were six units. One of the two-bedroom units was occupied by his mother and her family; and another small family had the other. A retired civil servant occupied a one-bedroom unit and the other one-bedroom contained a young couple. The remaining two apartments were studios; a security guard had one, and a university student the other. All the residents shared a laundry, yard space and wi fi. His cell rang, it was Gayle and he was happy to talk to her.

"You deh home yet?" she asked. "Yeah, going to eat...." "Come out to Sirgany now! Don't wait to eat, and run don't walk. I am over by the sea grape patch." Sirgany beach was not a registered fishing beach. It was just a strip of sand beside open land where one or two fishermen were happy to pull up their boats.

The beach was fifteen minutes walk from Lilly’s house, and the excitement in Gayle’s voice caused Ramiro to jog most of the way. He was curious to go as she was not flighty as most girls that he knew, so the thought that it must really be worth the urgency.

It was the time of day when shadows were long and the Western sky was painted a wash of orange and blue. He got there before dark and carefully picked his way across garbage and seaweed and driftwood that had been washed up on the shore, as well as the small shrubs that were steadfast along the coastline.

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If his mother ever knew that Gayle was not hurrying back with the lobsters, she would be angry because they need to be kept alive until the last minute before they were cooked.

He saw Gayle and when he was close, she held his arm and took him a few steps into the patch of sea grape trees where there was an area of uncovered sand. One spot was moving and wriggling as scores of small turtles were struggling up through the sand, and flopping out of the darkness of the shade trees towards the glimmering sea.

Ramiro crouched beside her. As the sea lapped a gentle, uneven rhythm on the shore, and as the lobsters clicked and shuffled in the covered plastic bucket beside them, each little hatchling successfully made it to the water.

"They are babies, but they have to find their own way and raise themselves," Gayle said quietly. She was happy that it had been possible for Ramiro to come out and share the moment with her. Better than any of her other friends, he would understand the respect and the relief that she felt seeing each new born turtle successfully unearth itself and reach its home in the sea. They also shared the private moment when he convinced her to leave a nest of turtle eggs alone. She was far removed from that girl who only saw her environment as something from which she could take, and never responsible for.

“Have you heard from Sawdust again, Ricky?”

“Not since last week. He told me that he will be coming home for the Independence holidays. So I will see him soon.”

“But is he still going to come home for good?”

“One year he said is what he will be away for now. He has a plan to save enough to do some science subjects here, and that can qualify him to get into a six-month course on equine nutrition or a one-year course on equine sports therapy. He and some other grooms are trying hard for Augusta to run courses from time to time, they are getting the right links abroad.”

Ramiro said it quite easily, but he knew that these were amazingly big dreams that his father had that would not come easy, especially if he were to return home and now stay in an international equestrian environment. More than anything, however, he wanted his dad home. He missed the times that they spent together.

The two children got up and together held the handle of the pail with the lobsters in water and slowly started to walk home. They did not talk and Ramiro hoped that Gayle understood what he was saying about his father’s desire to move ahead in his career, but still promising to be there. She was his sister now, and having her there was also

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very important to him. Ramiro wondered if he was being too selfish to want these three people close to him all of the time, but he felt he needed his mother, his father and now his sister. Needing them, and their being there for him, felt good.

Gayle’s cell phone rang. She showed Ricky the screen so that he could see that it was Lilly calling. They smiled and walked a little faster to go home.

-30-

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